Serious Health Setback

First, I'll address Sheila's current health with COVID...  She has a low grade fever coming and going all through the day.  She's exhausted.  She has a mild sore throat and she is coughing and sneezing with a runny nose.   Other than the fatigue which is noticeably affecting her, she seems to be doing better than she did with the flu a month ago.  I can only assume she is doing relatively well with this bout of COVID due to being current in her vaccinations and boosters.  

The really frustrating thing is that when she contacted her doctor's office this morning they pretty much did nothing for her because she has not tested positive for COVID.  The fact that I have tested positive and she is symptomatic apparently means nothing for getting treatment.  She is over 50 years old so she is in the higher risk category so common sense is telling me that her doctor's office should have jumped on getting her on Paxlovid since she is symptomatic and I tested positive in the same small household.  Instead, they have done nothing.  

Then we turn to my health and that gets me even more frustrated even though I was instantly given Paxlovid.  

I guess I am frustrated because I don't seem to be improving.  Actually, I feel as though I am getting worse and I am almost done with my course of Paxlovid.  I'm feeling as though I am set back to the first time I had COVID in 2020.  I was quite ill for many months.  I couldn't walk more than a few feet without stopping and gasping for breath.  Truthfully, none of my bouts with COVID have been short nor easy.  To make matters worse, I have serious lingering breathing issues everyday as well as worsened inflammation in my joints.

One of the big problems is that I am not fully recovered from a previous bout of COVID before I get infected with a new bout of COVID again.  My primary illness seems to be compounding this problem by adding problems of its own.

As anyone who reads this blog regularly probably already knows, my health has been quite lousy this entire calendar year due to my fourth bout of COVID and serious long-COVID lingering symptoms.  We had everyone here at our house for Christmas last year and I got COVID for the fourth time.  The last thing I wanted to happen was to get COVID yet again (fifth time) the very first time we attempted to travel for a short trip out of town, however, that is exactly what has happened with this trip to Manhattan.

I feel like am back at square one facing months of struggling with poor health again.  Every single time I get this virus, it requires a minimum of three to four months to recover.  The last time I had it I required almost a full year of recovery and, even then, I wasn't fully back to normal.  I have been on steroids to get me as close to normal as possible.

I'm still seesawing back and forth with fever.  Mostly, the fever returns late in the day even if I sleep all afternoon (as I have been doing).  My eyelids are swollen and interfering with my peripheral vision.  I have thick gunk in my sinuses and throat which is sometimes blocking my airway so I'm constantly trying to clear it all out.  My O2 saturation is still in the upper 90s which is good but I feel like I am having mild difficulty breathing today.  Actually, my breathing feels too much like it was back in January (11 months ago) when I took an ambulance ride to the hospital.  

My taste is skewed but, honestly, I'm not sure if that is due to COVID or the Paxlovid.  This skewed taste didn't start until the moment I started my first dose of Paxlovid.  My mouth tastes like I let three aspirins dissolve in my mouth without any water.  Since starting on Paxlovid this taste has been constant and consistent.  It does get more pronounced whenever I take another dose and wanes slightly over time but, overall, it is constant and consistent.  That is a pretty nasty taste to have in your mouth all the time!

I must be more exhausted than I think because the thought of attempting to do anything whatsoever does not appeal to me.  Well...  I want to do some fun things but I don't even have the energy to get through the daily things everyone just does every day without a single thought.  

I'm feeling as though each time I start to feel sort of normal again after months of feeling miserable, I get COVID again which knocks me back months and makes me feel quite lousy again.  I'm about ready to become a devout hermit.

I can't even begin to plan for next month or even next week or even tomorrow.  I'm back to just trying to get through today.  Beyond today is uncertainty...  beyond today is just darkness.  

Consequently, every time I hear some ignorant fool proclaiming, as though they are some sort of medical expert, that COVID is no different than a cold or the flu, it gets me profusely angry.  I can't believe that anyone could be so absolutely and even blissfully ignorant by accident to not see how many people around them are dying and struggling as a result of this virus.  To be that ignorant, you really have to work at it which would mean it is not necessarily blissful ignorance but more likely sheer stupidity.