Anyone still masking when not required?

[JustMe]

I just stopped (in almost all situations) a couple of weeks ago. Previously I had kept masking for a few reasons 1) I work at home and the amount of time I needed to mask up to decrease my chances of getting sick were not difficult for me 2)Being self-employed/no sick days having to be out more than a few days/having long-term effects are always a potential concern for me 3) I just did feel things happened sooner than I was comfortable 4)It was still required in health care settings, including for me as a therapist if I was going to work in an office- somehow I felt while that was in place it was no biggie for me to put on a mask while indoors. I decided to stop in my every day life for the following reasons 1)The requirement to mask in most healthcare situations stops 4/3; this just means something to me. 2) My kids are not masking and ds in particular not only goes to public school but is on a sports team where he basically is more of a "risk" to me than most anything I do. 3)less worried that we would be too negatively impacted if we do get sick (still not happy about long covid possibilities but very little I can do to avoid that when my kids are not masking 4)I do still feel awful for people who are very high risk, but me masking helps them so minimally when pretty much no one else is.

I think I would still mask if/when I am in an airport. things like indoor concerts are things I may or may not mask for (dont have any coming up)

[LD92599]

Only when required; quite a few Dr offices I frequent are doing away w/ the requirement. We just traveled via air and cruise, hardly anyone was masked on the cruise. and the cruise was 20 guests shy of capacity.

[PZMommy]

My kids mask at school. My youngest has been a close contact 5 times this school year, so he wants to keep masking. I’ve been on medical leave since January, and was masking at work up to that point. I go back in two weeks and will probably mask until I see how many of my kids are sick. One bug after another has circulated through my classroom. My physical therapist office still requires masking. My surgeon’s office has signs saying masks required, but they certainly don’t enforce it. I mask there as it’s a small overcrowded waiting room. My husband no longer masks at work (high school teacher), but does mask at the medical facilities as required.

[Snow mom]

DD masks in public spaces including school. She’ll hang out with close friends without her mask but wears it when we are around most people. She still hasn’t had Covid and finds wearing the mask not bothersome. She did go back to school in the fall without a mask but as soon as cases started to tick up locally she started to wear it again.

Everyone else in our family is mainly mask free. I’ll often wear a mask when I’m in public with just DD.

[erosenst]

Happy to do so if required, but also if they have one for me. I still keep a stash in my car, but my purse is iffier. Until maybe 9 months ago I was on planes, but no longer do so. Rationally, I know that's not the place because of the air filtration/lack of confirmed cases of spread on planes. But the one time I did catch it was while traveling (likely from extended time in an airport) so...I felt better. Or something...

[bcafe]

No. I haven’t been anywhere where they are requiring it either. Medical offices and dentist/ortho do not require them.

[Tenasparkl]

We just flew over spring break and wore masks in the airport and on the planes. We also went to two Broadway shows and wore them in the theaters. I got a head cold right before we traveled, so I felt like this was good for not feeling I was sharing my cold with others too.

My daughter still wears one a lot of the time at school, but that's mostly because she doesn't like people to see her braces.

[mom2binsd]

As many of you know, I work in a nursing home, but I do PRN at a few different places as well. My home building has been mask free/optional since Feb (we had a brief 10 days in Jan but then had two covid cases). If someone has any symptoms they test, if negative, most people are masking so they don't sniffle and cough. We have a few residents who chose to mask, and a few staff who do as well, visitors have the option and we are no longer doing temp screening for staff or visitors.

If a building says wear a mask, I wear a mask, but most of the therapists will take them off in our room with no patients present.

I have not worn a mask in public since I don't know when, maybe last summer?

I've had covid, all vaxxed, no underlying conditions. Still following handwashing and other precautions.

BEING ABLE TO COMMUNICATE TO MY ELDERLY PATIENTS, WITH HEARING/COGNITIVE/SPEECH DEFICITS HAS BEEN WONDEFUL, THE MASKS MADE MY JOB AS A SPEECH THERAPIST AWFUL.

[dogmom]

Yep. My general rule of thumb is I don’t want to get Covid from someplace I feel stupid stupid getting it from. Hanging out in person with friends, OK. Getting on the commuter train I have to listen to someone hacking on? Stupid. Grocery shopping, stupid. Going out to dinner with my husband to a nice restaurant? OK, worth it. That’s all. Not very scientific, but manageable. I work at a hospital, so zero problems wearing it to prevent immunocompromised people from getting it. Must be working, 3 year, bathed in it working in Covid surge ICU, still haven’t gotten it.

Besides, I’ve been loving not having a cold for 3 years. Baaahhh. Call me a sheeple, I like not being sick. And honestly, I find bras more uncomfortable.

[twowhat?]

DH is an ER MD and he is not going to stop masking. He doesn't want the flu/RSV and all the other stuff going around. As a funny aside, he knows he has resting b face. While wearing a mask, his face looks less so. His patient satisfaction scores actually went up because he looks more pleasant!!!!!! So he is not going to stop wearing one!

OMG this made me laugh so hard!!!

Yep. My general rule of thumb is I don’t want to get Covid from someplace I feel stupid stupid getting it from. Hanging out in person with friends, OK. Getting on the commuter train I have to listen to someone hacking on? Stupid. Grocery shopping, stupid. Going out to dinner with my husband to a nice restaurant? OK, worth it. That’s all. Not very scientific, but manageable. I work at a hospital, so zero problems wearing it to prevent immunocompromised people from getting it. Must be working, 3 year, bathed in it working in Covid surge ICU, still haven’t gotten it.

Besides, I’ve been loving not having a cold for 3 years. Baaahhh. Call me a sheeple, I like not being sick. And honestly, I find bras more uncomfortable.

This is where we are heading. My kids are still masking at school but I'm at the point where if they wanted to stop wearing them (which they don't), it would be OK with me. We are trying to transition to situational risk-reduction (on a personal level)...things like ramping up masking in the 2 weeks prior to an important event (like vacation), in crowded public indoor spaces or in poorly-ventilated public indoor spaces, public transportation (airports, planes, trains). We mask in health/medical settings 100% regardless of the requirements. And similar to dogmom, where it's just easy to mask because I don't want to get covid doing things like grocery shopping, Costco, etc. I was just at a conference in Florida where LITERALLY NO ONE WEARS MASKS and honestly felt SUPER self conscious about it. I had my mask on at first while inside the convention center but I ended up taking it off whenever the crowd thinned. I could tell it was a well-ventilated space (freezing...and you could feel the air moving). I did have dinner with colleagues indoors in crowded restaurants. I decided I was just gonna take that risk for the sake of making better work connections. And in the back of my head I kept thinking most people in Florida have already had covid.


I think I'm at the point where it's about practical risk reduction vs zero covid. Only DD2 in our family has had covid, that we are aware of. No one else has gotten it. Yet. And yes, I'm still afraid of the unknowns associated with covid infection. Sigh.