As I have discovered over the past few days, having COVID really stinks.
I dropped by Evans Clinic in Huntingdon Thursday morning to get my nasal passages swabbed, and, go figure, that test came back positive.
For a few days before that, I had been experiencing a scratchy throat and a bit of a cough, but I just thought it was allergies or a summer cold or something like that. But then on Wednesday afternoon, it came down on me like a ton of bricks. Throat on fire, pounding head, chills, body aches, zero energy, a ragged, painful cough – it was not exactly a pleasant experience.
And Wednesday night was pretty bad. Between hacking up my lungs and shivering under the covers, I didn’t really get any sleep to speak of. And, by the time I rolled my diseased carcass out of bed Thursday morning, I was pretty sure I either had COVID or a really nasty case of the flu.
My mom fell ill on Wednesday, as well, so when I tested positive, she went and got tested herself. But, oddly, her test came back negative, and her doctor told her she probably had the flu. Given that we both got sick at the same time and we had been around each other quite a bit during the previous days, both of us having the same contagious pathogen would seem to me to be the more likely option. But who knows? I guess anything’s possible.
In any case, we’re keeping away from each other for a while. I don’t want her flu on top my COVID, and, considering that she’s already had one confirmed case of COVID and two other suspected cases, she definitely doesn’t want another case on top of whatever bug she’s got.
This is my first confirmed case of COVID, though I suspect I might have had a mild case early on in the pandemic before testing was widely available.
But I must say, this virus could hardly have chosen a more inopportune time to invade my body. I was supposed to sign the lease on my new apartment in Huntingdon on Thursday, get the power hooked up, and then hopefully start moving my stuff in over the weekend. I’ll just have to put all that back a week or so, but that’s okay, I guess.
And my apologies to those who were expecting me at July 4th celebrations around the county, but I don’t think you would really want me spreading this stuff around in your community. And I hope I didn’t infect anyone before I knew what I had, but that’s entirely possible. If I have, then please forgive me.
But as I sit here typing this early Friday morning after a halfway decent night’s sleep, I am feeling a bit better – though I would still rate my current physical state as somewhere between roadkill and the southern end of a northbound pack animal. But the doc at Evans Clinic and City Drug’s drive-thru hooked me up with various meds, so, hopefully, that will take some of the edge off this thing.
When he came out to my car to give me the results of my test Thursday morning, the good doctor told me that he had good news and bad news. The bad news was, of course, the unfortunate fact that I had COVID. The good news, he said, was the fortuitous reality that this virus is not near the bad boy it was less than a year ago.
As he explained, a considerably lower percentage of COVID infections are resulting in hospitalizations and deaths these days – which I would surmise has a lot to do with a combination of vaccinations and natural immunity among those who have had the virus, along with more effective treatments and the fact that COVID has become less potent (albeit more contagious) over the past several months as it continues to mutate. And while I’m not quite out of the woods yet, I will go ahead and count myself fortunate in that regard.
