I thought being stuck in isolation with three children was nuts. Now, imagine having 38 kids – 21 of them at home, quarantined with you. In addition to the truckload of kids at home, hubby is also working from home.
And, to add a little more craziness to the equation, 10 of your children have tested positive for coronavirus. Oh, and did we mention you and your husband also have the virus?
This was the reality for Jeane and Paul Briggs, an American family who have enough kids to field three and a half soccer teams. The West Virginia couple have six biological children and 32 adopted kids. However, only 21 of the 38 kids currently live with the family.
Briggs family coronavirus scare
When the pandemic hit, the Briggs family was ordered to stay home like the rest of us, apart from going to work and getting essentials from the shops. Like all of us, the family got used to spending A LOT of time together.
However, in the midst of the craziness, one of the Briggs’ kids, Joseph, contracted the virus from his place of work – Sam’s Club, similar to Costco. Four days after Joseph started to feel ill, Jeane got sick experiencing everything from fever and dizziness to gastrointestinal issues.
“By Easter Sunday, I wasn’t feeling good and I told my family, ‘You’re going to have to take me to the ER,'” she told Inside Edition. “When I left, everybody was crying. It was a bad scene.”
Soon after, her husband began experiencing mild symptoms, and several other children followed. Of the 12 Briggs family members to contract it, only Jeane required hospitalisation and was released after four days.
They recently shared an update on their coronavirus and quarantine situation with Inside Edition. Have a look at the video below:
Disinfecting and homeschooling
To try and keep the remaining kids healthy, the family also started a cleaning routine where they would all get up a half an hour earlier than usual to disinfect the house. They also moved mattresses into other rooms to try and stop the sickness and designated certain bathrooms and areas of the house for those with the illness.
On top of all that? Jeanne still took on homeschooling duties for 14 of the kids. Which, to be fair, she does year-round anyway so she’s probably a lot more efficient at it than the rest of us!
“We’ve been fortunate that with all of the kids and ourselves who have had this and Jeane, only Jeane has had to be hospitalised,” Paul said. “So we’ve kinda been able to work through the symptoms.”
A full house
Paul and Jeane clearly have their hands full, even when isolation ends, but the couple adore their large family. The couple began adopting children back in 1985 and have adopted babies and older children from Russia, Ukraine, Bulgaria, Ghana, and more.
Some of the children were abused, some abandoned, but all are now happy, healthy, and probably, like the rest of us, just a touch stir crazy.
