This Happened To Me

Mild Cases of Covid-19 Don’t Necessarily Feel So Mild

Two Experiences In The Same Family And What We Did

You think you’re safe. You’re relatively young and overall healthy. This Covid-19 “hoax” is nothing to worry about.

Scare tactics.

Fear mongering.

The Government is trying to keep you secluded because — what exactly? They want the entire economy to collapse?

Maybe it’s no biggie, but maybe it is. Trouble is, you won’t know until it hits. And your experience will probably be wildly different from someone else’s.

I’m finally starting to approach normal again, after more than three months.

In early March I caught a cold

I was really angry about it because I had already started secluding myself in an effort to avoid the Novel Coronavirus. Being immunocompromised, a minor cold that takes most people a couple of days to kick will often land me in bed and unable to function for an average of probably three to four weeks.

Groceries were pre-ordered and picked up curbside. Everything else became online only. No visitors and no excursions.

I didn’t want to find out what Covid-19 might do to me.

I woke up in the middle of the night, sweating and shivering, with a sore throat and muscle aches, feeling pretty miserable. I didn’t think much of it other than “crap, here we go again” because it’s really not that unusual.

I pretty much spent that weekend on the couch, doing nothing. Regular cold symptoms with noticeable fever and chills, but no stuffy or runny nose.

It didn’t occur to me that this could be anything other than a cold. What developed the following week, however, was what set it apart from my regular bouts with common bugs.

When my sister called, I stood up to grab my phone off the table next to me. It felt like the whole world started spinning. When I answered I huffed and puffed as if I had just finished a marathon. Sis, naturally, wondered if she had caught me at a bad time.

“Nope, all I did was stand up. I feel like I’m not getting enough oxygen or something”.

It was weird. My airways felt raw. It was like a sore throat that wasn't quite where you expected it to be. It was somehow off to the side just a tiny bit, and a little bit lower. Every breath felt…. like it was irritating my entire respiratory system.

And I was wiped out. Just exhausted.

So I began my normal regimen of steam (running a hot shower with the door closed) and hot tea with raw honey. Several times a day.

I added Osha tincture to it, determined to knock this stuff out sooner rather than later. I also took Echinacea, vitamin D3, and huge amounts of vitamin C. (By huge amounts I mean about 4000 mg every few hours).

The worst airway irritation diminished after a few days. I was very happy with my success because bronchitis and strep throat are not things I wish to deal with.

It diminished, meaning it felt less acute. But it didn’t go away.

The fever lingered, and so did the exhaustion and air hunger. My daily, brisk mile-and-a-half walks were entirely out of the question. I could barely drag myself from the couch to the kitchen.

Nights were spent trying to sleep between fits of chills and what felt like flashes of “hot sunshine on sunburn”. I don’t know how else to describe this.

After several weeks, I started to think that maybe I was just whiny and going through menopause. The hot flashes got increasingly strong and frequent. In the evenings, while trying to be somewhat sociable, I had to sit next to the window with a big sweatshirt. I would alternate between freezing with my big shirt on, to having to very quickly throw that shirt off and open the window.

The overheating felt extremely urgent, like going from cold to literally boiling in seconds. This was every five minutes or so and got pretty annoying. Huffing and puffing the entire time of course. Then back to closing the window again and starting the cycle over.

I could sit entirely still watching a movie or something, and my pulse would suddenly shoot through the roof. Out of nowhere. Impossible to ignore. Something was very off.

I stopped doing everything I normally do. Just scooping the cat litter boxes caused me to feel like I was going to drop. Sweating, hyperventilating and sucking air like a maniac.

I became a very irritable, continually overheated, easily distracted jerk.

What people seem to not realize is that this can actually affect your thinking. You start to feel “fuzzy”. You suddenly can’t remember words and may have trouble recalling recent conversations or events. It’s maddening. Probably even more so to those around you.

This went on for many more weeks. The fever was a constant 99.2–100 all day. I didn’t even bother checking at night. I woke up sweating a lot and then freezing. And I remember a couple of times thinking to myself:

“I wonder if I’ll have enough energy to tell someone if I need to go to the hospital. Oh well, I’m so tired. We’ll see what happens.”

I was getting used to my new overheated, air-sucking, annoyed, and permanently exhausted self.

I kept up with the vitamins (at a reduced dose) and the tea with honey, but only added the Osha on occasion. This had started to feel chronic.

Roughly two months later I’d finally improved to the point where I started to recognize myself again. I still wasn’t back to normal, but definitely felt like I was on the way.

By this time, early May, a lot more information had become available and many places were shut down. I had learned a lot by then and was wondering if what I experienced could possibly have been COVID-19 or MECFS. No testing was available for either. The symptoms are very similar, down to the neurological issues.

That’s when my healthy 19-year-old son caught it. He woke up with similar symptoms to mine one night, and at first, we assumed it was a regular cold. I tended to him without even thinking to wear a mask.

A tele-health Doctor consulted a couple of days in said Covid-19 was very likely but not to worry, it’s usually minor. He still prescribed an inhaler to have on hand, however.

We added the breathing exercises below, which in combination with steam treatments were helpful. At first.

But it wasn’t enough.

This article in the New York Times explains why days 7–8 are so important.

For some lucky patients with mild illness, the worst is over after a week.

But some patients who have felt terrible continue to feel terrible or get worse. And some patients might start to feel better briefly then take a turn for the worse.

Patients should monitor their oxygen levels and check in with a doctor if they start to feel unwell. “We should instruct patients to have a lower threshold for contacting their doctor,” Dr. Levitan said. “I believe they should contact their physicians to have monitoring if they’re feeling worse.”

On the night of day seven, he ended up in the ER with breathing difficulties. He was diagnosed with COVID pneumonia from a chest Xray, received IV fluids and antibiotics, and was then sent home with an inhaler, more antibiotics, and orders to keep checking his O2 levels and temperature. He was to never ever let the fever take over because it causes dehydration which in turn can make the whole thing much worse, fast. He had to alternate acetaminophen and ibuprofen to constantly have a fever reducer in his system. Every couple of hours he had to take something. The fever consistently stayed around 99.5–100.5 — suppressed with medication.

Except

One night he woke up with the bed soaked in sweat. He was freezing. When we checked his temperature it was well below normal. 96.5 or thereabout. We actually spent an hour and a half trying to bring his temperature UP to normal.

A couple of days later we found out he had tested negative. For everything including COVID-19. I couldn’t get a test because I was never officially ill enough to seek medical attention.

Four days later his second chest Xray looked “good”, so we breathed a sigh of relief. Now the next phase had begun.

And that’s when my second round (presumably) kicked in. Back to inflammation, more breathing trouble, and the same treatment protocol as before.

This time felt nastier somehow though. It felt more “determined” to get a hold of my respiratory tract. So this time I added a homeopathic remedy that I had on hand and must have been lucky enough to pinpoint the right one (it can be dicey) because I only had to take one single dose for the airway inflammation to back off.

This has now been a month and a half for my son and well over three months for me. Neither of us is fully recovered yet. He can now completely understand that horrible air hunger feeling that used to seem almost silly.

We have just started back on our walks. Slowly.

Takeaways

1. The tests are not reliable. That is if you can even get one.
2. COVID-19 is very contagious. Don’t kid yourself.
3. Steam, breathing exercises, and fever reducers seemed to help one of us the most. For the other, it was probably the combination of steam and vitamins/herbs along with homeopathy.
4. You can catch this even if you’re extremely careful.
5. Anyone who refuses to wear a mask for the benefit of others is not someone you want to associate with.
6. Some unusual symptoms can be expected, such as memory problems and other neurological issues. They may or may not go away.
7. If you catch it, pay attention a week in. Just when you start to feel better it can suddenly take a turn for the worse.
8. Elevated pulse, blood pressure readings all over the place, and temperature fluctuations between way below normal and 103 or more in a very short time span are not unusual. Pay attention.
9. If your blood oxygen dips below 88% sustained, seek medical attention.
10. Anything less than admission to the hospital is considered “mild”. My son spent about four hours in the ER before being released and hence is considered a mild case.

He says it didn't feel mild.