Since I’m blogging about our COVID-19 experience, it was probably inevitable that toilet paper would come up at some point.

Since Costco came to Indianapolis, we’ve been buying our toilet paper there. We buy a giant package and keep the extra in the pantry. Usually, one of those lasts us four to six months.

Our last trip to Costco was in early March, maybe a week before the stay-at-home orders started to hit. We were out of toilet paper at home, so we grabbed one of the big packages. It was about a week later that the panic buying began, and I was glad that we happened to stock up right before.

What I didn’t think about was that four people using our home bathrooms 24×7 would mean a lot faster TP use. I organized the pantry about a week ago, and we only had one six-pack of toilet paper left. That means we’re using twice as much toilet paper as usual.

I didn’t really think this was a problem. I was planning to pick up a grocery order Friday, and I thought the toilet paper shortages were a thing of the past (replaced by shortages on chicken and beef). So I added an order of toilet paper to my Kroger order.

Only, Kroger didn’t have toilet paper. (Or paper towels, which we were also burning through and short on.) And then I started worrying. Waking up in the middle of the night thinking about toilet paper. I warned the family to conserve, but I didn’t really believe that the kids would remember to do so. Then yesterday my husband had to get something from Target, so I asked him to add toilet paper to his pick up order. None available. Sigh.

While my husband was out on his Target run, my daughter texted to asked him to pick up her prescription at CVS. Of course, I asked him to look for toilet paper while he was there. And they had it! Only like six rolls, but that buys us another week or two. Hopefully that will be enough.