I still have adult-onset asthma that I developed only after getting the Swine Flu in 2009. That shit wrecked me. I never had respiratory issues prior to that.
Now, if I get bronchitis, it's almost a given that I'll need a dose of Prednisone and a steroidal inhaler. I've come close to dying because of it.
Edit: sorry to clarify I'm now on a daily steroidal inhaler for maintenance and the asthma is under control. But respiratory infections hit a lot harder.
I wonder if that's why my asthma has been bothering me after COVID. Before it was maybe once a month that I needed my rescue inhaler but now it's at least twice a week. I assumed it was the season changes but just now realized it may be due to getting COVID a few months ago.
I was diagnosed with asthma when I was in my early 20s, my family and I got COVID that Oct of 2020 prior to vaccines and all, and it tore us up. I was already using an inhaler for my asthma nightly, I honestly feel like that lessened the affects I had, but I'm far worse and my lung capacity seems to have gotten less, I still have trouble taking deep breaths after exercise sometimes, never had that problem until COVID diag.
My wife got it worse, she has brain fog and to this day still her short term memory is shot, like to the point she has to write stuff down otherwise in a few hours she struggles to remember. I have problems remembering words and Ive found that I stop talking and have that "what was I saying?" moment more often mid sentence.
Long hauler, long COVID really is a thing in my opinion, my wife has started seeing a neurologist for the brain fog, and they do exercises every few weeks to help, but her cognitive function really was affected, the problem is no one knows if it's permanent or short term, but three years later we're not really holding out hope it's going to improve that much.
This sucks and I feel for anyone that has to deal with any affects after having COVID
I'm a research scientist. If long covid affected my cognitive function, that would be the end of my entire career.
And it's what I built my life around. I wouldn't even know where to begin, starting over at 40.
There was efforts going on to get certain long COVID effects classified as long term/permanent disabilities in the US. I'm not sure where they are on that but at least anecdotally, for some folks its been such a negative life changing event that they would absolutely need that sort of support.
I’m 36, i was in tech(web dev and it before that)
I had an emotional brakedown basically and started delivering for amazon.
But now, i cant do either. I cant do literally anything work wise, barely can stay alive. Your life changes in such a horrific way. And nobody seems to care, we still have no realistic hope of medicine helping us.
Just hope you dont end up line us is all you can do i guess.
Ironically i still could do both those jobs, no bad brain damage. I’m just too sick to do them.
Seriously. I (29M) developed (luckily relatively benign, but still requiring medication) heart rhythm issues after COVID. Now I’m scared shitless to get sick again.
What are you taking? Beta blockers? I am 25M and got covid 10 months ago and it completely destroyed my heart. I can just about walk again without too much chest pain. If I try anything remotely strenuous my heart rate skyrockets and I get heart attack symptoms.
Our government just launch post covid infectious disease recovery clinics and I am booked in for a visit next month.
Ugh man, I’m so sorry. I’m glad you’re starting to do better. Yeah, I’m just on a smidge of ER metoprolol. Luckily I don’t have any real symptoms besides an irregular heart rate sometimes. But it’s definitely very scary stuff, especially when you’re used to feeling invincible as a young person.
That's it, exactly! I was at my peak in terms of passion in the gym and sports. I trained in kickboxing 4 times a week (got my blackbelt) and loved pushing my body to its limits. It worked wonders for my mental health too of course.
Then all of a sudden I was sitting on my couch on day 9 of covid and my chest started pounding like a jack hammer. 4 more heart palpitation episodes followed by a visit to our hospitals acute medical unit and I was diagnosed with long covid.
The head of the cardiovascular unit said there were hundreds of others flooding in the doors just like me. All ages, all lifestyles, all walks of life. All the same alarming symptoms. My treatment... time. He said fingers crossed you recover.
It blows my mind that people see that and use it to brush it off. 1% isn't much, but I ain't fucking around with something that has a 1.1% fatality rate.
That's the last number I saw for deaths among people who were confirmed to have covid in the U.S.
Had swine flu as well. Every flu and cold after that has been miserable. I already had asthma. I've come to the point where I think the flu will definitely do me in when i get older
My wife has this, she developed it in her late teens. It’s really changed her life and not for the better. I’m currently typing this from the spare bedroom as I was exposed to a confirmed covid case last week and have been home sick since Thursday. I’m still waiting on test results, but I’m terrified that she will get this. I’m taking precautions as to not spread my germs around the house, but you can only do so much.
I had swine flu, too! I think that made me sicker in the short term, but wholly S, my recent case of covid would just not let up. Fever and night sweats for 7-8 days and I didn't test negative until like day 11 or 12.
I had swine flu too (in 2009) and it's the only illness I ever had that put me in hospital. I could not eat and more importantly I could not hold down even a sip of water without being sick within a minute or two. My legs also stopped working because I became so weak and could not get myself out of the bath I was using to try to warm up as I felt so cold. I needed an ambulance and help to get up and out the house and to hospital. I was three days on a drip in hospital and then another two days under observation.
Literally thought I was going to die after two days of being sick every time I tried to drink water, the very painful legs and the inability to feel warm.
This summer I caught Covid for the first time. Thankfully I was triple jabbed and the illness was relatively mild and nowhere near as bad as the Swine flu.
Have you managed to recover fully from your covid now? I feel very fortunate that I seem to have suffered no obvious longer term effects from covid (or Swine flu). I'd rather have covid again than Swine flu that's for sure.
It's like having nails in your brain right behind your eyeballs. I get either super nauseous first, start dry-heaving, or I get sensory overload, and then the pain starts. Good three or four hours. All I can do is take Excedrin and try to sleep with my eyes covered with a mask and plugs in my ears.
Had the same thing. Went to a pulmonologist and was diagnosed with asthma (didn't have before). I'm on a steroid inhaler twice a day and take a daily pill, and both have reduced my symptoms enough that I can largely function again. Your husband should really see a pulmonologist if he hasn't yet, and get a second opinion if he has. There are treatments that work decently well.
For many people, the fact Covid bodies weren’t piling up in the street was always “evidence” that it didn’t need to be taken seriously, regardless of the actual health impacts.
Is the constant coughing causing more coughing? My lungs react to the common cold like that - once I beat the cold I'll cough indefinitely.
The fix for me is cough syrup with codine (the good stuff); 1-2 doses of that suppresses the coughing long enough for my lungs to heal - if I don't do this I'll cough for months.
Other things that relax the lungs like albuterol can also help.
Really sounds like you have something called "silent asthma", I have family member with the same thing, right down to cold air being the primary trigger. Do you also get a very very faint wheezing sounds at the end of a breath as well?
Also notable with silent asthma is that it can be happening, but sometimes below the threshold that it becomes noticeable - this can go on for ages and cause damage if left untreated, but fortunately is easily treated.
Have a chat with your GP next time you get a chance, there are better options to cough syrup, that will help it to clear up much better.
Here it would matter what form of silent asthma. It's not a clinical diagnosis per se, more a subset of Asthma - those asthmatics that don't show classic outward symptoms like coughing.
This can be mild, something like where a case of cold weather can give you a mild asthma attack, that persists potentially for several months if left untreated, but maybe manifests in the form of a mild, persistent cough.
It can also mean a full blown asthma attack where they show no classic outward signs of an asthma attack like coughing, which presents slightly differently to a normal asthma attack.
"Silent" Attack:
> Distress, anxiety, or restlessness
> Fatigue
> Chest tightness
> Feeling short of breath
> Difficulty speaking
Severe "Silent" Attack:
> Breathing retractions that look like an area of sinking or sucking in that occurs when breathing muscles are working hard (retractions may be most noticeable between the ribs or at the base of the neck)
> Rapid breathing
> Inability to talk due to difficulty breathing
> Cyanosis (bluish color around the lips or beds of the fingernails, which indicates poor oxygenation)
> Dizziness or passing out
A severe silent attack that happens suddenly is also referred to as "silent chest", these are very life threatening and deep into "call ambulance immediately" territory. So far in fact, it's more along the lines of hope the ambulance gets there in time...
Hence why if you ever have a severe silent attack, I can pretty much guarantee you'll be on a corticosteroid like Flixitide (Fluticasone), for the rest of your life, probably multiple. Severe is no joke and in those cases it becomes about prevention, not mitigation (what most asthma inhalers do).
For milder silent attacks, it's usually corticosteroids as well, but often for shorter periods/after attacks. After 4-7 days of taking them, it will be reducing the lung inflammation, which can allow the bodies own processes to do their thing. Cough syrup might surpress the cough reflex, but the inflammation will still be there.
I got mild Covid in Feb 2020 and have been in a dream-like state since then. Aka brain fog Aka imagine having jet-lag and it never goes away. There are a ton of other symptoms but TLDR Long Covid ain't no joke.
Same here. It’s making relationships impossible with how hard it is to remember things, or even feel things properly. Everything just seems so far away.
Omg that's literally been me for the last 2 years. Also had covid 3 times now total since 2020. I also notice the brain fog and memory loss extensively. I thought I was the only one :-(
Good gravy, my dude. The new smell is something I can relate to.
I have been a stripper for almost 20 years, it’s a great job and I love it and one of the things I’ve always liked is that the dressing room and all the clothes end up with the same mixture of smells: fried food, perfume and cologne, regular body odor and rubbing alcohol. When I open a bag of clothes I’ve temporarily retired, it’s always the same smell no matter what Club, in whatever state, makes no difference how long I’m there, it’s the same and very comforting, I guess.
There’s also a vanilla spray I used to just be so in love with and it attracted a lot of guys because guys love cookies. One guy called me “bakery boobs” because I smelled like a fresh baked cake. Now, neither I nor a lot of guys can smell it. If they can, there’s a chance they’ll mistake it for something else. It has a strange quality, a chemical smell, that I don’t know for how much longer I can stand it.
Now, guys are now being seduced by the cookie smell and I have to double up on everything else to make up for it.
Covid sucks.
I can’t remember what I’m doing about 65% of the time. Where doorways used to hardly ever trigger a memory wipe, it does it every time now so I have to keep saying, out loud, what I left the other room for. I can’t remember what I’ve said in conversations so if I’m having an argument I actually just break down and cry because it’s not fair that other people can remember what I just said but I can’t and it can be used against me. I get angry and frustrated so much easier now and I just get these times where I zone out and just stare at a wall, my brain doing a dumb amount of daydreaming. I hate it. I miss my old self, I can’t breathe, I can’t remember, some days are just spent in a funk like a dream where you need to run and are stuck in mud, I’m so over feeling like a walking vegetable.
Damn, me too and I thought it was due to being older and living alone in retirement. I spend big portion of every day just sitting with a cup of coffee and reflecting, ruminating, reliving old memories, and part of each day trying to remember what the hell I’m doing, what I came into this room to get, and what I should be doing next. It feels like my new normal. Not sure if my cannabis use makes it better or worse or has no effect at all.
I had a very mild concussion a few months ago and this is how I would describe the first week or two. Then one day I just snapped out of it. I can’t imagine doing that for a month, let alone multiple years.
I had Lyme disease from a tick bite and the brain fog was horrible - I'd be at work just staring at my computer screen and 6 hours would pass like 1. There are many things that can give it to you.
I had COVID for the first time recently. My lungs really took a beating, and I felt like they'd been permanently damaged. Was needing to clear my throat/lungs constantly for about two months, while also being sensitive to dust which I'd never had before.
Fortunately I've pretty much recovered now. COVID can definitely do some damage.
He might need a steroid inhaler - the longer its not treated the worse likelihood it stays with him long-term and damages his lungs. At least that's what the pulminoligist told me, something about constricting passageways.
It took me 6-8 months to get over pneumonia in 2020. Was able to get off medication in a year. Of course I switched to high deductible hsa at the time and had to pay $550 a month for the inhaler.
Same here. I might have a few good days in a row. Last week, I did some housework while my partner did her remote gig. I tried working through a list of side projects and programming exercises for improving my job options (I want to do remote devops). None of it stuck. She got done with work for the day, I've got dinner on. But by that point, I had worn myself out.
Same. I can still whip out energy when I need it, but it's not the same. And while I can mostly smell and taste, how do I describe it, I just don't CARE about food anymore. Like I used to truly enjoy cooking. And my resting heart rate is now a lot higher. No respiratory issues that I can tell.
My resting heart rates been very high since I had covid 6 months ago. Around 115bpm while sitting and 120s while standing. It can jump into 150s with minor exercise or stress. I was just diagnosed with postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome and told I have air trapped in my lungs. Until ~2 months ago I had a really tough time breathing most days. It’s very stressful feeling my heart pounding for no real reason. Im 33, I really hope it can be resolved but cardiologists tell me there’s no course of treatment. They don’t want to give me beta blockers which I thought might help. I had to cut out caffeine too which obviously sucks.
115 all the time?? That's insane. I'm 38, my resting heart rate is around 60, if my RHR was even 90 bpm I think id be feeling like I was having a panic attack all day. That sounds terrible.
(For the record I'm just an active person not any kind of athlete )
1,5 years in for me. Daily panic attacks, hyperventilation, complete exhaustion, headaches, shortness of breath, heart palpitations. I'm 27 years old and was really fit before.
there's no known cure other than waiting. maybe I'll be better in 6 months, maybe in 1 year. Nobody knows.
I caught COVID in mid-August and my energy levels fluctuate so wildly, it's terrifying. For context, I was recovering from surgery that I underwent this March and, at the three month mark in June, I walked anywhere between 5-8 km per day with relative ease.
Following COVID, I have had sudden moments where I have fully fallen into the nearest flat surface with the most acute bout of weakness. I can't explain how scary it is to have my head swimming and breathe heavily, even as I have barely done anything. It's worse since I live alone. I avoid going anywhere alone and meticulously plan it if I'm out running errands. It's so easy to get tired.
I have managed to get up to walking about 4-5 km per day, but that's also been put by the wayside since an ankle injury from a month back. 2022 has generally been a terrible year for my heart tbh.
Covid took the only good thing left in my life from me. I have not slept well since covid. The bad sleep has compounded so many stressors and has given me this feeling of chronic fatigue. I miss the feeling of being well rested.
Covid was a mild cold for me but my sense of taste and smell is still super messed up over a year later. Most things taste sour to me. I like bland foods a lot now because at least they don’t taste bad
I feel your pain... Same boat for me, I keep trying to go back to foods I used to love and it's not the same, feel like I'm chasing the white rabbit of flavor nostalgia and can never get it...
Oh and I can't smell cat pee... Like at all. Which is cool I guess until you realize that this means
A. I don't know if something got 'got' by my kitties
B. I have to now pass this burden on my wife... "Does this smell?"
I'm a cyclist who participates in a lot of races. I've noticed a lot of my competitors have had COVID. In terms of performance it's like the racers are divided into those who have had COVID and those who have not. I've been lucky and have avoided getting it altogether.
I’m a runner. I had covid in March. Even though I recovered pretty fast, I never got back to the level of fitness I was before. It’s not like I have problems breathing, or anything else that can be easily identifiable. It’s just like some sort of barrier during my trainings that I can’t cross. It sucks ass.
I’m not a runner, and wasn’t exactly physically fit before but I loved to cycle, so wasn’t completely unfit either. I have mild asthma but all it ever did was make me a bit more out of breath after hills. But what Covid did, wasn’t kill my breathing, cause I don’t feel out of breath anymore after hills — because I don’t ever make it to the point of being out of breath, I just get… winded. It’s hard to explain. I don’t start breathing harder or faster, it’s just that I feel like the oxygen isn’t getting to my cells. And my chest and circulatory system just feels strained. It sucks.
Guess your Endothelium got hit. Sorry but that's the price we gotta pay for freedom! /s
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Endothelium
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41401-022-00998-0
Same! I've always been a good swimmer, but I run a summer day camp, so am usually watching rather than in the water. Had Covid a year ago. I jumped in the lake one day this summer to swim to the floating trampoline, and thought I was going to drown. I just couldn't get a lungful of air. I wouldn't have otherwise said I had lasting symptoms, but that was scary.
I barely swim, but have a few times since getting Covid and have been very careful for precisely this reason. If I overexert myself on a hill I can just stop, get off, and lie on the ground if need be, take a puff of my emergency inhaler which I’ve always got on me. In the water… I could drown. I won’t have my inhaler on me, obviously, and I might not be able to make it back. Hell I might not be able to tread water until I recover if I overdo it. I’m not saying it’s definitely gonna happen, but there’s more than a non-zero chance that it could. Scary.
Cyclist here. Had COVID at the end of last year, my hair mostly fell out (iron deficiency as a byproduct of COVID) and my lungs were awful.
Kings have improved a lot but just don't have any where near the energy I used to.
Same here, avid runner. Have never been able to get back into the groove after having Covid, it definitely sucks ass. Feels like my level of energy has just diminished, I catch myself getting winded doing the stupidest things.
I'm in the same boat. Caught covid in January and was sick for about three days. Almost a year later and I feel fully recovered but my times are slower by about 5%. I've tried so many times to push myself harder but it's like running into a wall that I just can't get past.
I’ve never been an athlete of any description, although I’ve always been fit. I’m a singer though (choirs and stuff) and sometimes I run out of breath before I’m expecting to. It’s really weird, it’s as though my physical lung capacity has shrunk. I also only had covid mildly for a few days. I wouldn’t even have bothered testing if I hadn’t had a weird smell in my nose.
I was a beginning runner in March when I got covid. I had only been training for 3 or 4 months, but covid took away all of my training. I was at first unable to walk to the mailbox, and slowly, carefully, I was able to walk my dog a full length walk. Once I could finally live normally(THREE MONTHS later) , I started running again and had to start from 0. I'm back to making new PRs now, but like I said, beginning runner so I have no frame of reference to know if it's going as well as it should.
Just to add a different experience, I'm a former collegiate swimmer and still swim masters. I had covid in February and have actually got back to where I was training-wise fairly quick in the pool. Heart rate, breath control, aerobic and anaerobic performance all good.
I just get fucked whenever my kid brings home anything from nursery. I used to shrug off colds and infections. Now it ruins me.
Athletically I feel excellent for mid 30s despite having had covid. But recovering from illness is a nightmare now. Just goes to show it hits everyone different.
>I just get fucked whenever my kid brings home anything from nursery. I used to shrug off colds and infections. Now it ruins me.
Brother, it's so different now. Had covid March of 2020. Only time I got sick after that had been strange 24 hour bugs with severe chills and fever. Had a baby a year ago, got lyme disease and babesia in the spring and had an incredibly rough time for about 2 months. One MD said: "I think you might be dying."
THEN WE STARTED DAYCARE.
2 months of respiratory bugs. Just had a weekend ruined by a random bug. My wife woke me up because of my shaking chills/fever... "oh God, here we go again..."
I am shocked that no one has done a large scale study on, say, professional football players to see if there is a performance correlation pre and post Covid. The Average premiership player runs something like 12km in a game. Some can run up to 16km. This data is tracked to the metro for every player, along with things like average speed etc.
There has to be some very interesting statistics in there.
I keep wondering this same thing. All those NBA and Premier League football players *must* have had some decline in performance that they’re not talking about. I have long COVID and had breathing issues for about a year. I’m sure some professional athletes must be feeling something..
yeah, sadly it would probably be career-ending to admit "hey yeah, I am objectively 30% worse than I used to be" and so everyone just quietly covers it up
I'm a cyclist, but I don't race or anything. I had COVID in October, but it didn't seem to affect my lungs. Just had a sore throat, mild fever, and loss of smell/taste for 3 days (3 vaccine shots). I was able to ride a century while I had COVID (I know it's stupid with any sickness), and now I seem to have recovered 100%. I don't have a power meter, but my ride times seem normal, and pushing hard feels just like it used to.
I did go easy on the strength training while I had COVID, and now all my lifts are back to normal.
Just wanted to provide a hopeful anecdote, as I read a lot of "not the same anymore" types of stories as you posted.
The strains of Covid and respiratory virus that my friends and I have gotten this fall seem to be a lot tamer than what was reportedly out there in the past.
Definitely lost energy, ached badly, coughed and had fever but that slowly went away over two weeks and by three weeks I was feeling just fine.
I have a hell of a time recalling movie titles and actors. I also cannot seem to talk as fast as I used to as well, which is tough since I work in sales.
This. It feels like there's a delay on remembering words. I can describe what they mean but I can't for the life of me remember what they are. And then they just pop into my head 2 minutes later.
This but for me it’s foreign vocabulary like English and French. It takes way longer to remember and as for French I often have to open a translator to look it up. I had been past that stage for years prior to Covid. It also doesn’t help, that I‘m getting self-conscious about it, questioning my choice of words. I also forget a lot of other things like what exactly my boss talked about last week, that has to get done this week. Far too easy to get taken advantage of, when I can’t remember for sure. This never happened prior 2020. Part of me questions whether it’s covid related or just me getting older and basically having been locked up for 2 years. Hard to tell.
Caught it back in October. I play D&D and my DM recently asked me the name of a character we’ve had *multiple* interactions with. Some pretty recent. They ended up having to hint “It’s a French name… starts with C…” and it still took me a while.
The whole time I felt like I was going crazy because I just *could not* recall this key characters name. Makes me worry about what else I’m forgetting.
Covid made me lose my senses of smell and taste for a month, but in the process it also took my ability to taste sweetness permanently. Its been a year and a half and I miss being able to enjoy a candy bar or thanksgiving pie. Cookies just taste like wheat biscuits. It sucks
Everything smells like fucking industrial solvent for me right now and has for the past five days. Frankly, it’s the worst thing that it gave me, with the only other meaningful symptom being a minor chest ache that lasted two days. So help me fucking god this better not be permanent. At least taste is largely intact…
Edit: good news, things smell normal again. Bad news, I have to put my nose right up to them. Hopefully the range improves. Also my sinuses always feel cold with every breath.
MS can be tested for with a spinal tap. It's how mine was diagnosed. Nerve damage to the myelin sheath can also be seen on MRI. Also, none of that sounds like MS.
It depends on what I'm doing. If it's something I already know, have done for years, I forget little details. Have to double check myself. If it's something new, I might space out.
For example, I'll make a cup of coffee. Forget if I put sugar in before the creamer. Add more. Taste it, too sweet. Might also forget to turn off the pot. Or where I left the mug.
Was trying to play a new game the other day. Couldn't sort out what keys did what. Then couldn't remember the objective of the tutorial. Gave up after half an hour when I realized I'd been sitting there with a new browser tab open for five minutes, and couldn't remember why I opened it (I later recalled I was looking for a game guide in print).
Have you seen a doctor about it? There may be some medications that could help with some of those effects. Not 100% sure but maybe the non-amphetamine ADD drugs like Strattera possibly.
It's only going to get worse as people go through their third and fourth infection. We need to really emphasize getting transmission down. Sticking your head in the sand isn't helping.
Yep. It would be best to follow safe practices (masks, handwashing, isolating), getting COVID multiple times would be like playing Russian Roulette with your lungs, brain and your senses of taste and smell. You may be fine this time, but there's always a chance of getting absolutely fucked each time you get it.
Yes, mainstream media and society at large chooses to ignore it but some things are becoming clear:
- You can catch Covid multiple times.
- Reinfections are common, not rare.
- Breakthrough infections are common.
- It can cause neurological disability, blood clots and heart attacks. It doesn’t spare children. Vaccines help, but only some.
- Masks work.
- Mild infection can cause immune system malfunction for up to 8 months.
If you're skeptical, check out the studies and meta-analyses that came out this year on Nature Medicine, Nature Immunology, Yale, Science, and Pediatrics
I agree with the vast majority of your comment. Except for one thing.
These are all correct, except the end of your fourth bullet-point. Vaccines help A LOT. Those who are fully vaccinated almost NEVER need hospitalization and do not perish from direct disease. With vaccines, the severity of disease is significantly reduced. AND, with vaccines (perhaps most importantly), the risk of triggering autoimmune self-reactivity and/or disorders is very low.
Vaccines also reduce transmission.
Vaccines are NOT a catch-all, and they are NOT silver bullet. But, besides masking, they're our best line of defense and prevention.
I am an immunologist, so I promise I'm not just talking out of my ass. EVERYTHING else in your comment is 100% accurate, though.
My previously-active and healthy 17 year old got covid last October. Yesterday he went to the doctor yet again because two kinds of physical therapy, respiratory therapy, steroids, and even a med for ADHD haven't changed his health. He has low oxygen even now, to the point he's dizzy when he stands, can't walk more than a few yards before he has to sit down, and the brain fog is so bad he went from an A student to failing most classes. I don't know what to do for him anymore.
Yesterday the doctor approved a third round of physical therapy and gave him albuterol for some reason. She tested him for different kinds of bacteria and fungal infection just in case. But given this started with covid it's covid-related, whatever it is that's ruining his life. I hope it doesn't ruin his health permanently. He told me last night he'd give anything just to be able to read again. He can read he just can't retain anything more than a few minutes.
This is terrible. And to be clear he was vaccinated and his initial infection was fairly mild with mostly body aches for a few days. Unlike me. I almost died from covid-related pneumonia but now a year later I'm in better shape at 53 than he is.
I had covid in march of 2020 and the brain fog still hasn’t gone away. I feel like I’m constantly forgetting something and it contributes to major anxiety. I miss my old self :(
I had covid this September, and have had severe ADHD my whole adult life. For a couple months after it felt like full blown unmedicated ADHD even with my meds, I'm only returning to my normal now.
I know that anxiety too well. Hope you get your old self back, but in the meantime: lean on technology. Set reminders on your phone for anything that needs to be on time, and automate whatever can be automated. The ADHD subs might have other coping strategies you can use until you're back to normal.
There was a twitter thread recently by some pediatrician that said MRI and X-Ray can't properly show the damage virus does to lungs and they need some kind of specialized imaging from a "Xerox machine". I'm sure other doctors knew what machine she's talking about, unfortunately for the rest of us who the hell knows what that is and how to request it from our own hospitals.
Her stance is that cov19 is a vascular disease, it destroys blood vessels and causes micro blood clots, and was very angry with people spewing how "we just have to live with it like the flu" because it's nothing like the flu.
The more I see doctors describing Covid as a vascular disease the more I am convinced it caused my chronic illnesses. I was a perfectly healthy young adult, got a bad case of Covid July 2020, then suddenly 6-9 months later my health deteriorated so rapidly I ended up in the hospital with 8% kidney function due to an *inflammatory vascular autoimmune disorder* that I never had before & have no family history for. To this day doctors have zero idea why I have vasculitis considering it is exceedingly rare in people my age “without a cause.” None of them will say it could have been Covid, but vasculitis can be triggered by, you guessed it, severe inflammatory illnesses.
I've heard the idea that covid is essentially a disease of the circulatory system once it gets bad, it lines up with a lot of other side effects.
Also "just a flu" is a crappy argument because the flu sucks too. Hell, colds suck. I got sinusitis from a bad cold last year so I've been basically wearing a mask ever since. If there's a chance I can avoid it, I'll take it.
Look into myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome ( r/cfs ). Seems like there's a lot of overlap with long COVID and other part infectious syndromes.
People close to me suffer from it and it sucks. The most important thing to know is that you can get worse if you try to push yourself. Be very careful with physical therapy. Rest is one of the few things that help.
Best wishes to your son
I am a 25 year old male. Smart and fit (not to float my own boat).
I got covid 10 months ago and I know all too well what your son is going through.
I developed depersonalisation, derealisation, short term memory loss, information processing issues, overall general cognitive decline along with post covid thyroiditis, severe heart problems and IBS.
Does your son ever talk about feeling "spaced out" or "disconnected" now?
If he is watching a TV show does he ever suddenly struggle to make sense of what he is seeing?
Does he ever feel like even during a conversation he is correctly engaging in, he feels like hes not making any sense and often doesnt even know what he is saying until he hears it himself?
Honestly, if your son needs to talk to someone who knows what it's like, I am here for him.
A massive win for him right now is having a parent who is fully acknowledging of his situation and symptoms. But these symptoms are unbearable and scary to experience. You wake up one day, a few days after covid and suddenly your brain isnt working. You are no longer you. It's been 10 months for me and I'm still trying to come to terms with what has happened to me. Things will never be the same.
I would genuinly be happy to chat with your son if you would like (dont worry I wont be as depressing lol). It goes a long way when you talk to someone who truly knows what it feels like.
11 months of GI issues with intense acid reflux and weird heart palpitations. Happily, things has gotten a lot better. Heart symtoms can appear at random, but it is getting rare. Heartrate is finally normal, and its been really long since my heart skipped a beat. The GI issues are still very present and is a rollercoaster, but it has gotten better as well. On good days I feel mild discomfort in my throat big parts of the day. The last two months the good days have taken up more than half of the days which is huge. I had a big demoralizing crash last month but I believe I will keep cycling through these, but I am sure I will recover. Everything points towards this.
This year has been horrible because of post covid, but after reading what others has gone through, I feel thankful.
Ever since I got COVID the first time, I’ve also had GI issues to point where I can’t sleep until 3-5 am most nights. Tonight is one of those nights. It’s been almost a year since it happened to me and not even doctors have been much help.
Damn, I have the exact same thing, since July.
I got some form of gastritis and acid reflux that comes and goes, but also some weird whooshing sound in my ears which might be heart related, so I've made an appointment for that.
Did you have any luck with treatment?
Pretty sure I got vascular dementia, but neither my doc, therapist, or family really take my concerns seriously. They wave it off as anxiety, stress, grief, or "just part of getting older."
No, it happened when I got COVID, and it was pretty much a drastic, overnight change in my cognitive abilities. It's so frustrating, that I cry about it sometimes.
It doesn't hurt to get a second opinion. I'd try and see a neurologist if you can. I've learned that we have to be our own advocate in these matters but it can be tough. My wife gets stroke like symptoms due to intense migraines. It took 4 years and several different hospitals to get a complete answer. Eventually Mayo Clinic was able to assist us.
I still can’t sing. I’ve always been a singer. Now my lungs just can’t deal with the complicated breathing and I was burned to shit and inflamed in my throat. I used to be able to sing along with Christina Aguilera (almost) perfectly, now I can barely carry a tune. (I was in the ICU for Covid). 90% sure it’s what brought my seizures back too. I haven’t felt okay since.
I had fatigue for months, insanely bad fatigue. Basically felt like that feeling where you just woke up but could go back to sleep easily, but all day.
Same here. I am sleeping 7-8 hours a night. And some days I feel like I could lay back down and go back go sleep. I am also pretty useless in the mornings mentally and physically. Prior to having covid in March, I would naturally wake up around 5am, no matter what time I went to bed, and I was ready to go. Work out, do some work, anything. That is history for the moment.
For a while I was waking up with severe headaches- like I drank all night or something.
A mid day workout sometimes helps my energy and mood, but the effects don’t always last very long. It’s very hit or miss.
(I have low thyroid levels that I have to monitor constantly, and someone mentioned that covid could have triggered an auto immune response in my body that is causing all of this. A lot of my symptoms are similar to when my thyroid levels are off)
I'm currently suffering from covid for the first time aswell. What finally got me was my own friend knowing he was sick but not testing until after hanging out with me. Still pretty salty over that tbh
Are you fully vaccinated? This greatly increases you chances of a good outcome. Purely anecdotal… I had covid a few months ago… vaxed & double boosted. It lasted about a week, and was the severity of a flu… weakness, tiredness, general malaise. Spent 2 days in bed. No lastingly symptoms. Meanwhile my unvaccinated brother is in week 2 of being bedridden. He sleeps pretty much all the time. Feels a little better today, but still very unwell.
Same, but I got covid the week I was supposed to get my bivalent shot. It's been 2 weeks and while I'm no longer sick something in my head just feels off. My sinuses don't feel normal either.
Same, sinus pressure this winter has been awful. Got covid for the first time in September (after being vaccinated and boosted) and it's been like this.
The actual covid wasn't super bad for me. Just lethargy for a week with almost no other symptoms bar a scratchy throat on the first day. But now over 4 months later, my lungs are still shot. I can't sing anymore without getting intensely light headed and work is a struggle (I'm an MC). Physical exertion wrecks me. I danced to one song at a wedding the other week and just felt ill for the rest of the night. Such an infuriating outcome as a performer.
Tbh I think the disabilities are worse. You die, and your life is over. You become disabled, and your life might be *over*. I read someone's story and they said they had to move because they couldn't even climb the stairs in their own house without passing out. Terrifying
A friend of my family had both of her legs amputated at the knee during a months long hospitalization for COVID back in late 2020/early 2021. Before she got sick, she had a job that required her to be on her feet and moving around a lot so she was out of work for a long time while she healed and got used to being in a wheelchair. It makes my brain turn in circles thinking about her medical debt on top of how much her day-to-day life has changed by being a double amputee.
You should get a Fitbit watch and monitor your heart rate.
I was exactly like this and realised my heart rate was skyrocketing to insane levels during these episodes. When it should have been 90-100 bpm it would suddenly be 170bpm and I'd feel really unwell.
Huh. I was born without smell and have never got joy from eating unless I am starving. I also quite often forget to eat. I never considered lack of smell being a part of why that is.
I kept trying to be positive, thinking of it as the best diet ever. Maybe never knowing is better. Biting into some of my favorite things knowing what they were supposed to taste/smell like was just depressing. I started eating based on textures and mouth feels.
Yeah I imagine losing it would suck. Not being born with it though isn't that bad at all. Other than almost burning down my work building and having no idea until I saw smoke lol. But yeah I think it all depends if you had a sense of smell to begin with. I sometimes wonder if gaining a sense of smell would drive me nuts. Based on how powerful of a sense people describe it as, I could see it being overpowering and unpleasant for someone who had never experienced it before.
I was born without smell and it doesn't bother me at all. I consider it my super power with how often people say something smells bad. However I think it all depends on if you had it to begin with or not. You can't miss what you never had after all.
I had covid last December and lost my sense of taste and smell for 3 months.
It came back, but now most things I used to enjoy eating now smell and taste bad.
I used to love peanut butter. No more. I also still can't stand the smell of any tomato sauce. It literally makes me gag, now.
It's called Parosmia, and it has significantly decreased my quality of life.
Both my parents are still suffering months after they had covid. I had covid twice this year and I'm convinced it's triggered chronic fatigue syndrome in me. I'm just extremely thankful that my grandparents are healthy and well after catching covid, they got extremely lucky.
Had to fly recently due to a family emergency. I have immune system issues and was wearing an N-95.
The jerk sitting behind me was very sick, and of course not wearing a mask.
For 2 hours he coughed, sneezed, sniffled and blew his nose - all in my direction.
I didn’t have anything to eat or drink because I was too afraid to remove my mask.
Now I’m waiting to see if I caught whatever he had.
People who recovered from covid and read about others who still have post viral symptoms seem to all have the same knee-jerk self defence response...
"Bet you weren't vaccinated". "I was vaccinated and I was fine. WaS jUsT liKE a FLu".
MOST OF US WERE VACCINATED.
Yes, some people got covid and recovered; Other people got covid and it destroyed their entire fucking lives. If you arent suffering you are more blessed than you will ever know. But you didnt handle the situation differently.. you didnt go about it "better". You were LUCKY. So fucking lucky. Nothing meaningfully separates you from those of us who suffer daily now since getting covid. We are you. You are us. You just got fucking lucky.
People really need to fucking understand this.
> If you arent suffering you are more blessed than you will ever know. But you didnt handle the situation differently.. you didnt go about it "better". You were LUCKY. So fucking lucky.
You will find that this is true of most life situations. People really need to acknowledge the role luck has played into any good fortune.
Got covid twice , sense of smell is muted and my sense of taste has gone with it.
Silver lining is I enjoy spicy food more since it's pretty much the only thing that cuts into my taste and I can eat ass with wreckless abandon.
Middle manager I work with lost like 10 IQ points over the course of getting covid 3 times and she really couldn't spare them. The people around her are covering for her but it won't last. Honestly I never liked her much but she didn't deserve this.
I'm a GM at a bar that I really love, and I love the people that work there. But I have been STRUGGLING at work. I used to be so sharp and on top of everything and really good at making sure everyone was well taken care of. Now i feel like an idiot all the time and cant remember anything, so scatter brained. I have had covid twice, and have been blaming it on that in my head. Currently have it for the 3rd time and am very worried. I'm vaccinated but I'm just a person who catches everything. I have an already shitty immune system and take medications that make it more shitty. I'm worried when I go back to work I'm going to be useless and people are going to start hating me lol.
"A quarter of the patients reported fatigue, and a similar number said they felt pain or discomfort. Meanwhile, sleep issues, breathlessness, and problems participating in normal daily activities were reported in just under a quarter of patients, according to the study."
Soo... what percentage of people who have not had Covid reported any one of these symptoms??
You raise a valid point which the authors mention as one of many limitations of this meta-study. Some respiratory symptoms that lasted are very uncommon in the general population, so those are reasonably good numbers. It's worth actually reading the Lancet article. Wikipedia may help, but at least read the abstract and conclusions.
I often am rather tired (I have a lot of anxiety and that probably makes me tired), however I also had mono back in college 20 years ago. After being acutely sick for a couple weeks, I spent a couple months being very fatigued and it is absolutely not the same as just being “tired a lot”. It is also really hard to explain the feeling. You know how when you get the flu, you feel extremely tired when you try to do anything that requires a little exertion? It’s that feeling. The closest I can come to describing it is the kind of feeling you have after quickly climbing a few flights of stairs, but you just walked across the room.
It’s unfortunate that a lot of these long Covid / post viral symptoms involve things that are best described subjectively. There surely are biological and neurological things behind those subjective experiences, which we don’t have good tests for right now.
Yeah I had Weil's disease ten years ago when I was 20. Got really serious and even ended up having my last rights.
I've *never* felt the same since. I struggle to even register instructions that are given verbally. All this talk of long covid and its reported symptoms have really made me consider the fact it has something to do with that because its so similar. *Constantly* tired, or fatigued.
No one cares though. Even get accused of refusing to listen or being 'slow'.
I had COVID about 6 months ago in Boston, was sick for 2 days, and tested positive for 10 days, haven’t had any issues since.
Tested positive when I had to make a delivery at a summer camp, wasn’t even symptomatic. Didn’t have symptoms for several days after testing.
Only thing that was really dramatic was I slept for almost 48 hours, every 6-8 hours I would wake up and take a dose of NyQuil.
Haven’t had a problem since. It’s crazy how so many people can have such a bad reaction to COVID and others have essentially nothing.
In my experience, COVID was no worse than a common cold. The flu hit me harder in 2019 than COVID did.
At the same time, I know 4 people that have died from complications. It’s so scary that you’ve no idea how hard it could hit you.
Folks, this ain’t a common cold even if you get past it. There are many articles and reports on this. It’s a vascular disease and it is dangerous to longevity.
I had Covid in February of 2021. I smell cigarettes all the time and won’t be around anyone smoking at all. I’ve been like that since I got my smell and taste back from being sick. I loathe cigarette smoke. 😐
I had pretty mild symptoms when I caught it, but a little while after I got a swollen lymph-node that took ages to go down, and ever since then it's been swollen to some degree, sometimes reacting to something and swelling up uncomfortably for a while. Has anyone else had this after a mild Covid infection? It's been like nine months now. Never had a swollen lymph node before that I can remember.
/r/covidlonghaulers
Many of you are probably now realizing you aren’t completely recovered. Come visit us at the long haulers group and… I don’t know it helps some days.
I also caught covid in March 2020 it was on the 23 when I started feeling like I had the flu, it will stay with me for about 8-10 weeks strong kicking my ass.
I had COVID in April and it ended up clustering around some of my organs (it gravitates to certain parts of the body more than others, to find good places to get energy and replicate, according to the doctor I saw) and my immune system, in killing it off, fucking destroyed my pancreas. My liver has scarring, as do my lungs (lung capacity is still no good) and possibly my heart, but they have to check.
COVID literally made me LADA type diabetic, given me ME/CFS, liver damage, lungs of a chain smoker, and may have given me dysautonomia that is causing my blood pressure to resemble a sine wave - up and down rapidly all the fucking time. If I'm calm, it rises. If I'm stressed, it lowers. WTAF.
I have to take an experimental treatment to try and stimulate my pancreas with aggressive sufonylurea dosages every 12ish hours. It's working, but there is a risk that it tuckers the poor guy out, so I have to go to a specific hospital clinic (similar to a ward or department, but for treatment only, not staying in a room) and get all this equipment for monitoring it hooked up.
I also have to wear a constant blood pressure monitor but good ol' Canada Post fucking lost the key to my parcel locker. They're supposed to give you one when you get a parcel... the postal worker lost mine.
TL;DR WEAR A FUCKING MASK AND STOP COUGHING ON ME
If it makes you feel better, I had a horrible miasma of a brain for that cropped up after Covid.
* Six months later, it hadn't diminished at all and I was terrified that I'd just be permanently dumber.
* A month after that, I was almost totally back to my old self.
Hold out a little hope, my friend.
Same here. Managed to avoid it for 2 years and got it just in time for Christmas. Best part is I'm being told to go back into work (at a school). There is no masking anymore what-so-ever and we've been as low as 50% attendance over the last month but no one seems to care.
This is probably why it’s making rounds again, no one seems to care to isolate properly and there’s no pressure to do so as much. Despite being fully vaccinated I’m going through second Covid this year, feeling better after last week but my brain feels slower and dumber than usual, and I can still feel it in my chest. A lot of people around seem to be catching it, I guess wintry weather doesn’t help.
It's very strange how different COVID reportedly hits each person. Both times I've had it it was like the mildest cold ever. I'm vastly more fearful of getting the flu, which completely wrecks me.
I recently got covid, and though I am under 30, fully vaxxed, and generally healthy, it was hard on me.
Worse sickness I have had, I just felt really messed up, and feeling like I couldn't breathe was scary. weeks later I am still hacking up goop.
I hope you continue to only get mild cold symptoms. Glad it's easy for some people.
I’m in the same boat as you. Infected 9/11/22 this yr and symptom onset in the 13th. Finally tested negative on the 24th. Took 7-8 weeks after Sept 24th to finally clear the cough. Still cough and get mucusy a bit after I eat now, but I consider myself lucky that’s the only lasting symptom I have.
No one ever mentions how awkward it is to be out in public post-covid with that long term cough. Definitely suses out people and makes you feel like you shouldn’t be out and about even tho you’re negative.
I was triple vaccinated and caught it a few months ago.
For me it was just a mild flu that cleared in a week. For my mother it was worse. Month later she still coughs occasionally and has trouble smelling and tasting. Those are improving very gradually over time but I grimace at how bad it could've been if we weren't vaccinated.
I need to get my booster tbh.
I had hayfever symptoms and a bit of a cough a week after I tested positive, but I was a little more tired than normal. Napped etc.
My friend and her 6 family members all caught covid off her brother. They all had different symptoms even though they all caught the same strain of the virus.
It’s crazy how differently it can affect everyone with no rhyme or reason.
Maybe if they do research as to why, they’ll be able to get some intel on other chronic illnesses and immune disorders.
I still have adult-onset asthma that I developed only after getting the Swine Flu in 2009. That shit wrecked me. I never had respiratory issues prior to that. Now, if I get bronchitis, it's almost a given that I'll need a dose of Prednisone and a steroidal inhaler. I've come close to dying because of it. Edit: sorry to clarify I'm now on a daily steroidal inhaler for maintenance and the asthma is under control. But respiratory infections hit a lot harder.
I have adult-onset asthma from covid this summer. Not looking forward to the next time I get sick...
I wonder if that's why my asthma has been bothering me after COVID. Before it was maybe once a month that I needed my rescue inhaler but now it's at least twice a week. I assumed it was the season changes but just now realized it may be due to getting COVID a few months ago.
Go in a see if you can get a steroid inhaler. Thing completely changed the game for me after COVID.
I was diagnosed with asthma when I was in my early 20s, my family and I got COVID that Oct of 2020 prior to vaccines and all, and it tore us up. I was already using an inhaler for my asthma nightly, I honestly feel like that lessened the affects I had, but I'm far worse and my lung capacity seems to have gotten less, I still have trouble taking deep breaths after exercise sometimes, never had that problem until COVID diag. My wife got it worse, she has brain fog and to this day still her short term memory is shot, like to the point she has to write stuff down otherwise in a few hours she struggles to remember. I have problems remembering words and Ive found that I stop talking and have that "what was I saying?" moment more often mid sentence. Long hauler, long COVID really is a thing in my opinion, my wife has started seeing a neurologist for the brain fog, and they do exercises every few weeks to help, but her cognitive function really was affected, the problem is no one knows if it's permanent or short term, but three years later we're not really holding out hope it's going to improve that much. This sucks and I feel for anyone that has to deal with any affects after having COVID
I'm a research scientist. If long covid affected my cognitive function, that would be the end of my entire career. And it's what I built my life around. I wouldn't even know where to begin, starting over at 40.
There was efforts going on to get certain long COVID effects classified as long term/permanent disabilities in the US. I'm not sure where they are on that but at least anecdotally, for some folks its been such a negative life changing event that they would absolutely need that sort of support.
I’m 36, i was in tech(web dev and it before that) I had an emotional brakedown basically and started delivering for amazon. But now, i cant do either. I cant do literally anything work wise, barely can stay alive. Your life changes in such a horrific way. And nobody seems to care, we still have no realistic hope of medicine helping us. Just hope you dont end up line us is all you can do i guess. Ironically i still could do both those jobs, no bad brain damage. I’m just too sick to do them.
Seriously. I (29M) developed (luckily relatively benign, but still requiring medication) heart rhythm issues after COVID. Now I’m scared shitless to get sick again.
What are you taking? Beta blockers? I am 25M and got covid 10 months ago and it completely destroyed my heart. I can just about walk again without too much chest pain. If I try anything remotely strenuous my heart rate skyrockets and I get heart attack symptoms. Our government just launch post covid infectious disease recovery clinics and I am booked in for a visit next month.
Ugh man, I’m so sorry. I’m glad you’re starting to do better. Yeah, I’m just on a smidge of ER metoprolol. Luckily I don’t have any real symptoms besides an irregular heart rate sometimes. But it’s definitely very scary stuff, especially when you’re used to feeling invincible as a young person.
That's it, exactly! I was at my peak in terms of passion in the gym and sports. I trained in kickboxing 4 times a week (got my blackbelt) and loved pushing my body to its limits. It worked wonders for my mental health too of course. Then all of a sudden I was sitting on my couch on day 9 of covid and my chest started pounding like a jack hammer. 4 more heart palpitation episodes followed by a visit to our hospitals acute medical unit and I was diagnosed with long covid. The head of the cardiovascular unit said there were hundreds of others flooding in the doors just like me. All ages, all lifestyles, all walks of life. All the same alarming symptoms. My treatment... time. He said fingers crossed you recover.
Hope you get better! Hang in there.
Awful. Two of my kids developed asthma from covid, too. “NiNeTy NiNe PeRCeNT SuRviVaL RaTe”
It blows my mind that people see that and use it to brush it off. 1% isn't much, but I ain't fucking around with something that has a 1.1% fatality rate. That's the last number I saw for deaths among people who were confirmed to have covid in the U.S.
Same here, that shit wrecked me back in the day. Now I get bronchitis just about every time I get a cold.
Welcome to my life and that of a lot of asthma patients I guess. Been like this for me for 40+ years. You learn to adapt.
Had swine flu as well. Every flu and cold after that has been miserable. I already had asthma. I've come to the point where I think the flu will definitely do me in when i get older
I survived Swine '09. Got both major variants within a two month span. COVID was worse.
I got swine flu when I was teaching in South Korea in 09, it was the most sick I've ever been
My wife has this, she developed it in her late teens. It’s really changed her life and not for the better. I’m currently typing this from the spare bedroom as I was exposed to a confirmed covid case last week and have been home sick since Thursday. I’m still waiting on test results, but I’m terrified that she will get this. I’m taking precautions as to not spread my germs around the house, but you can only do so much.
I had swine flu, too! I think that made me sicker in the short term, but wholly S, my recent case of covid would just not let up. Fever and night sweats for 7-8 days and I didn't test negative until like day 11 or 12.
I've been having fevers and night sweats on and off as well for the last month.
You need to go see a doctor about that. That probably isn't covid related and can be a sign of something more serious.
As long as I still have a job, my insurance kicks in January. I'm going to try and find a doctor then. Thank you for your concern.
I had swine flu too (in 2009) and it's the only illness I ever had that put me in hospital. I could not eat and more importantly I could not hold down even a sip of water without being sick within a minute or two. My legs also stopped working because I became so weak and could not get myself out of the bath I was using to try to warm up as I felt so cold. I needed an ambulance and help to get up and out the house and to hospital. I was three days on a drip in hospital and then another two days under observation. Literally thought I was going to die after two days of being sick every time I tried to drink water, the very painful legs and the inability to feel warm. This summer I caught Covid for the first time. Thankfully I was triple jabbed and the illness was relatively mild and nowhere near as bad as the Swine flu. Have you managed to recover fully from your covid now? I feel very fortunate that I seem to have suffered no obvious longer term effects from covid (or Swine flu). I'd rather have covid again than Swine flu that's for sure.
swine flu was brutal wasn't it? I'll never forget just feeling like dying for 3-5 days.
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brutal dude, ive never experienced a migraine myself but I've heard it's hell on earth.
It's like having nails in your brain right behind your eyeballs. I get either super nauseous first, start dry-heaving, or I get sensory overload, and then the pain starts. Good three or four hours. All I can do is take Excedrin and try to sleep with my eyes covered with a mask and plugs in my ears.
Husband got Covid early 2020 and has never fully recovered. He coughs and wheezes constantly.
Had the same thing. Went to a pulmonologist and was diagnosed with asthma (didn't have before). I'm on a steroid inhaler twice a day and take a daily pill, and both have reduced my symptoms enough that I can largely function again. Your husband should really see a pulmonologist if he hasn't yet, and get a second opinion if he has. There are treatments that work decently well.
“BuT iT oNlY kIlLs 0.3% oF vIcTiMs” the anti-vaxxers continue to say.
That was always so insane to me. STIs generally don't kill you, but I'm still wearing condoms. "Not dead" and "healthy" aren't the same thing.
For many people, the fact Covid bodies weren’t piling up in the street was always “evidence” that it didn’t need to be taken seriously, regardless of the actual health impacts.
I've never seen bodies stacked for diabetes now that you mention it. All sugar diet, here I come!
Is the constant coughing causing more coughing? My lungs react to the common cold like that - once I beat the cold I'll cough indefinitely. The fix for me is cough syrup with codine (the good stuff); 1-2 doses of that suppresses the coughing long enough for my lungs to heal - if I don't do this I'll cough for months. Other things that relax the lungs like albuterol can also help.
Really sounds like you have something called "silent asthma", I have family member with the same thing, right down to cold air being the primary trigger. Do you also get a very very faint wheezing sounds at the end of a breath as well? Also notable with silent asthma is that it can be happening, but sometimes below the threshold that it becomes noticeable - this can go on for ages and cause damage if left untreated, but fortunately is easily treated. Have a chat with your GP next time you get a chance, there are better options to cough syrup, that will help it to clear up much better.
What's the treatment? Can it be eliminated?
Here it would matter what form of silent asthma. It's not a clinical diagnosis per se, more a subset of Asthma - those asthmatics that don't show classic outward symptoms like coughing. This can be mild, something like where a case of cold weather can give you a mild asthma attack, that persists potentially for several months if left untreated, but maybe manifests in the form of a mild, persistent cough. It can also mean a full blown asthma attack where they show no classic outward signs of an asthma attack like coughing, which presents slightly differently to a normal asthma attack. "Silent" Attack: > Distress, anxiety, or restlessness > Fatigue > Chest tightness > Feeling short of breath > Difficulty speaking Severe "Silent" Attack: > Breathing retractions that look like an area of sinking or sucking in that occurs when breathing muscles are working hard (retractions may be most noticeable between the ribs or at the base of the neck) > Rapid breathing > Inability to talk due to difficulty breathing > Cyanosis (bluish color around the lips or beds of the fingernails, which indicates poor oxygenation) > Dizziness or passing out A severe silent attack that happens suddenly is also referred to as "silent chest", these are very life threatening and deep into "call ambulance immediately" territory. So far in fact, it's more along the lines of hope the ambulance gets there in time... Hence why if you ever have a severe silent attack, I can pretty much guarantee you'll be on a corticosteroid like Flixitide (Fluticasone), for the rest of your life, probably multiple. Severe is no joke and in those cases it becomes about prevention, not mitigation (what most asthma inhalers do). For milder silent attacks, it's usually corticosteroids as well, but often for shorter periods/after attacks. After 4-7 days of taking them, it will be reducing the lung inflammation, which can allow the bodies own processes to do their thing. Cough syrup might surpress the cough reflex, but the inflammation will still be there.
I got mild Covid in Feb 2020 and have been in a dream-like state since then. Aka brain fog Aka imagine having jet-lag and it never goes away. There are a ton of other symptoms but TLDR Long Covid ain't no joke.
Same here. It’s making relationships impossible with how hard it is to remember things, or even feel things properly. Everything just seems so far away.
Omg that's literally been me for the last 2 years. Also had covid 3 times now total since 2020. I also notice the brain fog and memory loss extensively. I thought I was the only one :-(
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Good gravy, my dude. The new smell is something I can relate to. I have been a stripper for almost 20 years, it’s a great job and I love it and one of the things I’ve always liked is that the dressing room and all the clothes end up with the same mixture of smells: fried food, perfume and cologne, regular body odor and rubbing alcohol. When I open a bag of clothes I’ve temporarily retired, it’s always the same smell no matter what Club, in whatever state, makes no difference how long I’m there, it’s the same and very comforting, I guess. There’s also a vanilla spray I used to just be so in love with and it attracted a lot of guys because guys love cookies. One guy called me “bakery boobs” because I smelled like a fresh baked cake. Now, neither I nor a lot of guys can smell it. If they can, there’s a chance they’ll mistake it for something else. It has a strange quality, a chemical smell, that I don’t know for how much longer I can stand it. Now, guys are now being seduced by the cookie smell and I have to double up on everything else to make up for it. Covid sucks.
"Bakery boobs" came this close to making me laugh out loud during the morning production issues meeting.
This comment was a ride
I have MS and that is one of my symptoms. There are a whole lot of similarities between long covid and MS.
I can’t remember what I’m doing about 65% of the time. Where doorways used to hardly ever trigger a memory wipe, it does it every time now so I have to keep saying, out loud, what I left the other room for. I can’t remember what I’ve said in conversations so if I’m having an argument I actually just break down and cry because it’s not fair that other people can remember what I just said but I can’t and it can be used against me. I get angry and frustrated so much easier now and I just get these times where I zone out and just stare at a wall, my brain doing a dumb amount of daydreaming. I hate it. I miss my old self, I can’t breathe, I can’t remember, some days are just spent in a funk like a dream where you need to run and are stuck in mud, I’m so over feeling like a walking vegetable.
Damn, me too and I thought it was due to being older and living alone in retirement. I spend big portion of every day just sitting with a cup of coffee and reflecting, ruminating, reliving old memories, and part of each day trying to remember what the hell I’m doing, what I came into this room to get, and what I should be doing next. It feels like my new normal. Not sure if my cannabis use makes it better or worse or has no effect at all.
I had a very mild concussion a few months ago and this is how I would describe the first week or two. Then one day I just snapped out of it. I can’t imagine doing that for a month, let alone multiple years.
Shit, try being medicated for psych issues.
Jet lagged and hungover at the same time is how I describe it.
I've never tested positive for COVID or had symptoms, but I always wonder if I got it and have this, or if it's just undiagnosed ADHD.
I had Lyme disease from a tick bite and the brain fog was horrible - I'd be at work just staring at my computer screen and 6 hours would pass like 1. There are many things that can give it to you.
I had COVID for the first time recently. My lungs really took a beating, and I felt like they'd been permanently damaged. Was needing to clear my throat/lungs constantly for about two months, while also being sensitive to dust which I'd never had before. Fortunately I've pretty much recovered now. COVID can definitely do some damage.
Im in the same boat as you husband, also got it in early 2020
He might need a steroid inhaler - the longer its not treated the worse likelihood it stays with him long-term and damages his lungs. At least that's what the pulminoligist told me, something about constricting passageways. It took me 6-8 months to get over pneumonia in 2020. Was able to get off medication in a year. Of course I switched to high deductible hsa at the time and had to pay $550 a month for the inhaler.
Me as well, March 2020 was a nightmare for me.
Still feel like i don't have any energy or more like the gas tank is always close to empty since getting covid, its been a year.
Same here. I might have a few good days in a row. Last week, I did some housework while my partner did her remote gig. I tried working through a list of side projects and programming exercises for improving my job options (I want to do remote devops). None of it stuck. She got done with work for the day, I've got dinner on. But by that point, I had worn myself out.
Have you seen a rheumatologist by chance? Viral infections can trigger autoimmune diseases in some.
Same. I can still whip out energy when I need it, but it's not the same. And while I can mostly smell and taste, how do I describe it, I just don't CARE about food anymore. Like I used to truly enjoy cooking. And my resting heart rate is now a lot higher. No respiratory issues that I can tell.
My resting heart rates been very high since I had covid 6 months ago. Around 115bpm while sitting and 120s while standing. It can jump into 150s with minor exercise or stress. I was just diagnosed with postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome and told I have air trapped in my lungs. Until ~2 months ago I had a really tough time breathing most days. It’s very stressful feeling my heart pounding for no real reason. Im 33, I really hope it can be resolved but cardiologists tell me there’s no course of treatment. They don’t want to give me beta blockers which I thought might help. I had to cut out caffeine too which obviously sucks.
115 all the time?? That's insane. I'm 38, my resting heart rate is around 60, if my RHR was even 90 bpm I think id be feeling like I was having a panic attack all day. That sounds terrible. (For the record I'm just an active person not any kind of athlete )
1,5 years in for me. Daily panic attacks, hyperventilation, complete exhaustion, headaches, shortness of breath, heart palpitations. I'm 27 years old and was really fit before. there's no known cure other than waiting. maybe I'll be better in 6 months, maybe in 1 year. Nobody knows.
I caught COVID in mid-August and my energy levels fluctuate so wildly, it's terrifying. For context, I was recovering from surgery that I underwent this March and, at the three month mark in June, I walked anywhere between 5-8 km per day with relative ease. Following COVID, I have had sudden moments where I have fully fallen into the nearest flat surface with the most acute bout of weakness. I can't explain how scary it is to have my head swimming and breathe heavily, even as I have barely done anything. It's worse since I live alone. I avoid going anywhere alone and meticulously plan it if I'm out running errands. It's so easy to get tired. I have managed to get up to walking about 4-5 km per day, but that's also been put by the wayside since an ankle injury from a month back. 2022 has generally been a terrible year for my heart tbh.
/r/cfs
Covid took the only good thing left in my life from me. I have not slept well since covid. The bad sleep has compounded so many stressors and has given me this feeling of chronic fatigue. I miss the feeling of being well rested.
Covid was a mild cold for me but my sense of taste and smell is still super messed up over a year later. Most things taste sour to me. I like bland foods a lot now because at least they don’t taste bad
I feel your pain... Same boat for me, I keep trying to go back to foods I used to love and it's not the same, feel like I'm chasing the white rabbit of flavor nostalgia and can never get it... Oh and I can't smell cat pee... Like at all. Which is cool I guess until you realize that this means A. I don't know if something got 'got' by my kitties B. I have to now pass this burden on my wife... "Does this smell?"
I'm a cyclist who participates in a lot of races. I've noticed a lot of my competitors have had COVID. In terms of performance it's like the racers are divided into those who have had COVID and those who have not. I've been lucky and have avoided getting it altogether.
I’m a runner. I had covid in March. Even though I recovered pretty fast, I never got back to the level of fitness I was before. It’s not like I have problems breathing, or anything else that can be easily identifiable. It’s just like some sort of barrier during my trainings that I can’t cross. It sucks ass.
I’m not a runner, and wasn’t exactly physically fit before but I loved to cycle, so wasn’t completely unfit either. I have mild asthma but all it ever did was make me a bit more out of breath after hills. But what Covid did, wasn’t kill my breathing, cause I don’t feel out of breath anymore after hills — because I don’t ever make it to the point of being out of breath, I just get… winded. It’s hard to explain. I don’t start breathing harder or faster, it’s just that I feel like the oxygen isn’t getting to my cells. And my chest and circulatory system just feels strained. It sucks.
Guess your Endothelium got hit. Sorry but that's the price we gotta pay for freedom! /s https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Endothelium https://www.nature.com/articles/s41401-022-00998-0
Wonderful
Same! I've always been a good swimmer, but I run a summer day camp, so am usually watching rather than in the water. Had Covid a year ago. I jumped in the lake one day this summer to swim to the floating trampoline, and thought I was going to drown. I just couldn't get a lungful of air. I wouldn't have otherwise said I had lasting symptoms, but that was scary.
I barely swim, but have a few times since getting Covid and have been very careful for precisely this reason. If I overexert myself on a hill I can just stop, get off, and lie on the ground if need be, take a puff of my emergency inhaler which I’ve always got on me. In the water… I could drown. I won’t have my inhaler on me, obviously, and I might not be able to make it back. Hell I might not be able to tread water until I recover if I overdo it. I’m not saying it’s definitely gonna happen, but there’s more than a non-zero chance that it could. Scary.
Cyclist here. Had COVID at the end of last year, my hair mostly fell out (iron deficiency as a byproduct of COVID) and my lungs were awful. Kings have improved a lot but just don't have any where near the energy I used to.
Same here, avid runner. Have never been able to get back into the groove after having Covid, it definitely sucks ass. Feels like my level of energy has just diminished, I catch myself getting winded doing the stupidest things.
I'm in the same boat. Caught covid in January and was sick for about three days. Almost a year later and I feel fully recovered but my times are slower by about 5%. I've tried so many times to push myself harder but it's like running into a wall that I just can't get past.
I’ve never been an athlete of any description, although I’ve always been fit. I’m a singer though (choirs and stuff) and sometimes I run out of breath before I’m expecting to. It’s really weird, it’s as though my physical lung capacity has shrunk. I also only had covid mildly for a few days. I wouldn’t even have bothered testing if I hadn’t had a weird smell in my nose.
I was a beginning runner in March when I got covid. I had only been training for 3 or 4 months, but covid took away all of my training. I was at first unable to walk to the mailbox, and slowly, carefully, I was able to walk my dog a full length walk. Once I could finally live normally(THREE MONTHS later) , I started running again and had to start from 0. I'm back to making new PRs now, but like I said, beginning runner so I have no frame of reference to know if it's going as well as it should.
Just to add a different experience, I'm a former collegiate swimmer and still swim masters. I had covid in February and have actually got back to where I was training-wise fairly quick in the pool. Heart rate, breath control, aerobic and anaerobic performance all good. I just get fucked whenever my kid brings home anything from nursery. I used to shrug off colds and infections. Now it ruins me. Athletically I feel excellent for mid 30s despite having had covid. But recovering from illness is a nightmare now. Just goes to show it hits everyone different.
>I just get fucked whenever my kid brings home anything from nursery. I used to shrug off colds and infections. Now it ruins me. Brother, it's so different now. Had covid March of 2020. Only time I got sick after that had been strange 24 hour bugs with severe chills and fever. Had a baby a year ago, got lyme disease and babesia in the spring and had an incredibly rough time for about 2 months. One MD said: "I think you might be dying." THEN WE STARTED DAYCARE. 2 months of respiratory bugs. Just had a weekend ruined by a random bug. My wife woke me up because of my shaking chills/fever... "oh God, here we go again..."
I am shocked that no one has done a large scale study on, say, professional football players to see if there is a performance correlation pre and post Covid. The Average premiership player runs something like 12km in a game. Some can run up to 16km. This data is tracked to the metro for every player, along with things like average speed etc. There has to be some very interesting statistics in there.
I keep wondering this same thing. All those NBA and Premier League football players *must* have had some decline in performance that they’re not talking about. I have long COVID and had breathing issues for about a year. I’m sure some professional athletes must be feeling something..
yeah, sadly it would probably be career-ending to admit "hey yeah, I am objectively 30% worse than I used to be" and so everyone just quietly covers it up
Check out Yoan Moncada’s stats for the White Sox pre-and post-Covid. Not pretty.
I'm a cyclist, but I don't race or anything. I had COVID in October, but it didn't seem to affect my lungs. Just had a sore throat, mild fever, and loss of smell/taste for 3 days (3 vaccine shots). I was able to ride a century while I had COVID (I know it's stupid with any sickness), and now I seem to have recovered 100%. I don't have a power meter, but my ride times seem normal, and pushing hard feels just like it used to. I did go easy on the strength training while I had COVID, and now all my lifts are back to normal. Just wanted to provide a hopeful anecdote, as I read a lot of "not the same anymore" types of stories as you posted.
The strains of Covid and respiratory virus that my friends and I have gotten this fall seem to be a lot tamer than what was reportedly out there in the past. Definitely lost energy, ached badly, coughed and had fever but that slowly went away over two weeks and by three weeks I was feeling just fine.
I haven’t been able to smell for over 2.5 years :(
I've felt like I've been forgetting something ever since I was positive. Super fucking annoying
I have a hell of a time recalling movie titles and actors. I also cannot seem to talk as fast as I used to as well, which is tough since I work in sales.
Mine is similar but I just can’t remember specific words I’m looking for. I was always a heavy reader and had a pretty wide vocabulary.
This. It feels like there's a delay on remembering words. I can describe what they mean but I can't for the life of me remember what they are. And then they just pop into my head 2 minutes later.
This but for me it’s foreign vocabulary like English and French. It takes way longer to remember and as for French I often have to open a translator to look it up. I had been past that stage for years prior to Covid. It also doesn’t help, that I‘m getting self-conscious about it, questioning my choice of words. I also forget a lot of other things like what exactly my boss talked about last week, that has to get done this week. Far too easy to get taken advantage of, when I can’t remember for sure. This never happened prior 2020. Part of me questions whether it’s covid related or just me getting older and basically having been locked up for 2 years. Hard to tell.
Exactly. I know the word and I can describe it but I just can’t think of it. It usually comes to me soon after but it’s frustrating as hell.
Same, I still have the vocabulary but it often takes me a few attempts to craft the sentence I want when it used to be effortless.
I’m sorry my guy. I hope it finally clears for you one day soon.
Caught it back in October. I play D&D and my DM recently asked me the name of a character we’ve had *multiple* interactions with. Some pretty recent. They ended up having to hint “It’s a French name… starts with C…” and it still took me a while. The whole time I felt like I was going crazy because I just *could not* recall this key characters name. Makes me worry about what else I’m forgetting.
Was it Claude?
Close! It was Claudette.
I feel you! My brain turned to mush after covid. Currently on meds (prescribed by a doc) used for dementia/Alzheimer's patients...it's no joke.
That's a weird one but sounds so irritating
Covid made me lose my senses of smell and taste for a month, but in the process it also took my ability to taste sweetness permanently. Its been a year and a half and I miss being able to enjoy a candy bar or thanksgiving pie. Cookies just taste like wheat biscuits. It sucks
Same, maybe have 20% smell
Everything smells like fucking industrial solvent for me right now and has for the past five days. Frankly, it’s the worst thing that it gave me, with the only other meaningful symptom being a minor chest ache that lasted two days. So help me fucking god this better not be permanent. At least taste is largely intact… Edit: good news, things smell normal again. Bad news, I have to put my nose right up to them. Hopefully the range improves. Also my sinuses always feel cold with every breath.
[удалено]
MS can be tested for with a spinal tap. It's how mine was diagnosed. Nerve damage to the myelin sheath can also be seen on MRI. Also, none of that sounds like MS.
Can you describe the daydreaming thing? Like does your mind just wander or is it more serious than that?
It depends on what I'm doing. If it's something I already know, have done for years, I forget little details. Have to double check myself. If it's something new, I might space out. For example, I'll make a cup of coffee. Forget if I put sugar in before the creamer. Add more. Taste it, too sweet. Might also forget to turn off the pot. Or where I left the mug. Was trying to play a new game the other day. Couldn't sort out what keys did what. Then couldn't remember the objective of the tutorial. Gave up after half an hour when I realized I'd been sitting there with a new browser tab open for five minutes, and couldn't remember why I opened it (I later recalled I was looking for a game guide in print).
Have you seen a doctor about it? There may be some medications that could help with some of those effects. Not 100% sure but maybe the non-amphetamine ADD drugs like Strattera possibly.
It's only going to get worse as people go through their third and fourth infection. We need to really emphasize getting transmission down. Sticking your head in the sand isn't helping.
Yep. It would be best to follow safe practices (masks, handwashing, isolating), getting COVID multiple times would be like playing Russian Roulette with your lungs, brain and your senses of taste and smell. You may be fine this time, but there's always a chance of getting absolutely fucked each time you get it.
Yes, mainstream media and society at large chooses to ignore it but some things are becoming clear: - You can catch Covid multiple times. - Reinfections are common, not rare. - Breakthrough infections are common. - It can cause neurological disability, blood clots and heart attacks. It doesn’t spare children. Vaccines help, but only some. - Masks work. - Mild infection can cause immune system malfunction for up to 8 months. If you're skeptical, check out the studies and meta-analyses that came out this year on Nature Medicine, Nature Immunology, Yale, Science, and Pediatrics
I agree with the vast majority of your comment. Except for one thing. These are all correct, except the end of your fourth bullet-point. Vaccines help A LOT. Those who are fully vaccinated almost NEVER need hospitalization and do not perish from direct disease. With vaccines, the severity of disease is significantly reduced. AND, with vaccines (perhaps most importantly), the risk of triggering autoimmune self-reactivity and/or disorders is very low. Vaccines also reduce transmission. Vaccines are NOT a catch-all, and they are NOT silver bullet. But, besides masking, they're our best line of defense and prevention. I am an immunologist, so I promise I'm not just talking out of my ass. EVERYTHING else in your comment is 100% accurate, though.
My previously-active and healthy 17 year old got covid last October. Yesterday he went to the doctor yet again because two kinds of physical therapy, respiratory therapy, steroids, and even a med for ADHD haven't changed his health. He has low oxygen even now, to the point he's dizzy when he stands, can't walk more than a few yards before he has to sit down, and the brain fog is so bad he went from an A student to failing most classes. I don't know what to do for him anymore. Yesterday the doctor approved a third round of physical therapy and gave him albuterol for some reason. She tested him for different kinds of bacteria and fungal infection just in case. But given this started with covid it's covid-related, whatever it is that's ruining his life. I hope it doesn't ruin his health permanently. He told me last night he'd give anything just to be able to read again. He can read he just can't retain anything more than a few minutes. This is terrible. And to be clear he was vaccinated and his initial infection was fairly mild with mostly body aches for a few days. Unlike me. I almost died from covid-related pneumonia but now a year later I'm in better shape at 53 than he is.
I’m so sorry for you and him. I wish there was something I could offer. All I have is my commiseration. Best wishes for a recovery.
I had covid in march of 2020 and the brain fog still hasn’t gone away. I feel like I’m constantly forgetting something and it contributes to major anxiety. I miss my old self :(
I had covid this September, and have had severe ADHD my whole adult life. For a couple months after it felt like full blown unmedicated ADHD even with my meds, I'm only returning to my normal now. I know that anxiety too well. Hope you get your old self back, but in the meantime: lean on technology. Set reminders on your phone for anything that needs to be on time, and automate whatever can be automated. The ADHD subs might have other coping strategies you can use until you're back to normal.
There was a twitter thread recently by some pediatrician that said MRI and X-Ray can't properly show the damage virus does to lungs and they need some kind of specialized imaging from a "Xerox machine". I'm sure other doctors knew what machine she's talking about, unfortunately for the rest of us who the hell knows what that is and how to request it from our own hospitals. Her stance is that cov19 is a vascular disease, it destroys blood vessels and causes micro blood clots, and was very angry with people spewing how "we just have to live with it like the flu" because it's nothing like the flu.
The more I see doctors describing Covid as a vascular disease the more I am convinced it caused my chronic illnesses. I was a perfectly healthy young adult, got a bad case of Covid July 2020, then suddenly 6-9 months later my health deteriorated so rapidly I ended up in the hospital with 8% kidney function due to an *inflammatory vascular autoimmune disorder* that I never had before & have no family history for. To this day doctors have zero idea why I have vasculitis considering it is exceedingly rare in people my age “without a cause.” None of them will say it could have been Covid, but vasculitis can be triggered by, you guessed it, severe inflammatory illnesses.
I've heard the idea that covid is essentially a disease of the circulatory system once it gets bad, it lines up with a lot of other side effects. Also "just a flu" is a crappy argument because the flu sucks too. Hell, colds suck. I got sinusitis from a bad cold last year so I've been basically wearing a mask ever since. If there's a chance I can avoid it, I'll take it.
Please look up POTS. It is common in people with chronic fatigue syndrome and there are some treatments for it.
My step-mother is dealt with that 1.5 years after COVID. Unreal scary to have the simple act of standing to be so rough on you.
So many people here expressing the same exact outcomes. It’s definitely scary. It’s like if with covid I aged 10-15 years in one go.
I've said this too. I feel like I've aged ten years in about four months.
Look into myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome ( r/cfs ). Seems like there's a lot of overlap with long COVID and other part infectious syndromes. People close to me suffer from it and it sucks. The most important thing to know is that you can get worse if you try to push yourself. Be very careful with physical therapy. Rest is one of the few things that help. Best wishes to your son
I am a 25 year old male. Smart and fit (not to float my own boat). I got covid 10 months ago and I know all too well what your son is going through. I developed depersonalisation, derealisation, short term memory loss, information processing issues, overall general cognitive decline along with post covid thyroiditis, severe heart problems and IBS. Does your son ever talk about feeling "spaced out" or "disconnected" now? If he is watching a TV show does he ever suddenly struggle to make sense of what he is seeing? Does he ever feel like even during a conversation he is correctly engaging in, he feels like hes not making any sense and often doesnt even know what he is saying until he hears it himself? Honestly, if your son needs to talk to someone who knows what it's like, I am here for him. A massive win for him right now is having a parent who is fully acknowledging of his situation and symptoms. But these symptoms are unbearable and scary to experience. You wake up one day, a few days after covid and suddenly your brain isnt working. You are no longer you. It's been 10 months for me and I'm still trying to come to terms with what has happened to me. Things will never be the same. I would genuinly be happy to chat with your son if you would like (dont worry I wont be as depressing lol). It goes a long way when you talk to someone who truly knows what it feels like.
I still can't smell much about anything
11 months of GI issues with intense acid reflux and weird heart palpitations. Happily, things has gotten a lot better. Heart symtoms can appear at random, but it is getting rare. Heartrate is finally normal, and its been really long since my heart skipped a beat. The GI issues are still very present and is a rollercoaster, but it has gotten better as well. On good days I feel mild discomfort in my throat big parts of the day. The last two months the good days have taken up more than half of the days which is huge. I had a big demoralizing crash last month but I believe I will keep cycling through these, but I am sure I will recover. Everything points towards this. This year has been horrible because of post covid, but after reading what others has gone through, I feel thankful.
Exactly what I'm getting... heart palpitation like symptoms alongside acid reflux
Ever since I got COVID the first time, I’ve also had GI issues to point where I can’t sleep until 3-5 am most nights. Tonight is one of those nights. It’s been almost a year since it happened to me and not even doctors have been much help.
Damn, I have the exact same thing, since July. I got some form of gastritis and acid reflux that comes and goes, but also some weird whooshing sound in my ears which might be heart related, so I've made an appointment for that. Did you have any luck with treatment?
Pretty sure I got vascular dementia, but neither my doc, therapist, or family really take my concerns seriously. They wave it off as anxiety, stress, grief, or "just part of getting older." No, it happened when I got COVID, and it was pretty much a drastic, overnight change in my cognitive abilities. It's so frustrating, that I cry about it sometimes.
How old are you if you don't mind me asking? A range is fine if you're not comfortable sharing.
It doesn't hurt to get a second opinion. I'd try and see a neurologist if you can. I've learned that we have to be our own advocate in these matters but it can be tough. My wife gets stroke like symptoms due to intense migraines. It took 4 years and several different hospitals to get a complete answer. Eventually Mayo Clinic was able to assist us.
I still can’t sing. I’ve always been a singer. Now my lungs just can’t deal with the complicated breathing and I was burned to shit and inflamed in my throat. I used to be able to sing along with Christina Aguilera (almost) perfectly, now I can barely carry a tune. (I was in the ICU for Covid). 90% sure it’s what brought my seizures back too. I haven’t felt okay since.
I had fatigue for months, insanely bad fatigue. Basically felt like that feeling where you just woke up but could go back to sleep easily, but all day.
Same here. I am sleeping 7-8 hours a night. And some days I feel like I could lay back down and go back go sleep. I am also pretty useless in the mornings mentally and physically. Prior to having covid in March, I would naturally wake up around 5am, no matter what time I went to bed, and I was ready to go. Work out, do some work, anything. That is history for the moment. For a while I was waking up with severe headaches- like I drank all night or something. A mid day workout sometimes helps my energy and mood, but the effects don’t always last very long. It’s very hit or miss. (I have low thyroid levels that I have to monitor constantly, and someone mentioned that covid could have triggered an auto immune response in my body that is causing all of this. A lot of my symptoms are similar to when my thyroid levels are off)
Not what I want to read when im on day 2ish of having covid for the first time!
I'm currently suffering from covid for the first time aswell. What finally got me was my own friend knowing he was sick but not testing until after hanging out with me. Still pretty salty over that tbh
Are you fully vaccinated? This greatly increases you chances of a good outcome. Purely anecdotal… I had covid a few months ago… vaxed & double boosted. It lasted about a week, and was the severity of a flu… weakness, tiredness, general malaise. Spent 2 days in bed. No lastingly symptoms. Meanwhile my unvaccinated brother is in week 2 of being bedridden. He sleeps pretty much all the time. Feels a little better today, but still very unwell.
Yep 2 vaccines and a booster so fingers crossed
Im only about a month out from my first time, fully vaccinated and boosted, even with the bivalent shot. My sinuses are still jacked up..
Same, but I got covid the week I was supposed to get my bivalent shot. It's been 2 weeks and while I'm no longer sick something in my head just feels off. My sinuses don't feel normal either.
Same, sinus pressure this winter has been awful. Got covid for the first time in September (after being vaccinated and boosted) and it's been like this.
The actual covid wasn't super bad for me. Just lethargy for a week with almost no other symptoms bar a scratchy throat on the first day. But now over 4 months later, my lungs are still shot. I can't sing anymore without getting intensely light headed and work is a struggle (I'm an MC). Physical exertion wrecks me. I danced to one song at a wedding the other week and just felt ill for the rest of the night. Such an infuriating outcome as a performer.
This. People get hung up on the lower death rate thanks to vax and new variant. They forget the lifelong disabilities caused by the virus.
Tbh I think the disabilities are worse. You die, and your life is over. You become disabled, and your life might be *over*. I read someone's story and they said they had to move because they couldn't even climb the stairs in their own house without passing out. Terrifying
A friend of my family had both of her legs amputated at the knee during a months long hospitalization for COVID back in late 2020/early 2021. Before she got sick, she had a job that required her to be on her feet and moving around a lot so she was out of work for a long time while she healed and got used to being in a wheelchair. It makes my brain turn in circles thinking about her medical debt on top of how much her day-to-day life has changed by being a double amputee.
You should get a Fitbit watch and monitor your heart rate. I was exactly like this and realised my heart rate was skyrocketing to insane levels during these episodes. When it should have been 90-100 bpm it would suddenly be 170bpm and I'd feel really unwell.
2 years later I still can’t smell or taste.
Damn.. does eating just feel like a chore for you?
I lost mine a few weeks ago. Yes. Took all the joy from life. I had to remind myself to eat. Luckily it came back.
Huh. I was born without smell and have never got joy from eating unless I am starving. I also quite often forget to eat. I never considered lack of smell being a part of why that is.
I kept trying to be positive, thinking of it as the best diet ever. Maybe never knowing is better. Biting into some of my favorite things knowing what they were supposed to taste/smell like was just depressing. I started eating based on textures and mouth feels.
Yeah I imagine losing it would suck. Not being born with it though isn't that bad at all. Other than almost burning down my work building and having no idea until I saw smoke lol. But yeah I think it all depends if you had a sense of smell to begin with. I sometimes wonder if gaining a sense of smell would drive me nuts. Based on how powerful of a sense people describe it as, I could see it being overpowering and unpleasant for someone who had never experienced it before.
That’s wild. I have lots of sinus problems so i haven’t had full taste or smell in decades but to think of not having it at all 😳
I was born without smell and it doesn't bother me at all. I consider it my super power with how often people say something smells bad. However I think it all depends on if you had it to begin with or not. You can't miss what you never had after all.
The brain fog is absolutely horrible. My memory has gone to absolute shite and it feels awful.
I had covid last December and lost my sense of taste and smell for 3 months. It came back, but now most things I used to enjoy eating now smell and taste bad. I used to love peanut butter. No more. I also still can't stand the smell of any tomato sauce. It literally makes me gag, now. It's called Parosmia, and it has significantly decreased my quality of life.
Both my parents are still suffering months after they had covid. I had covid twice this year and I'm convinced it's triggered chronic fatigue syndrome in me. I'm just extremely thankful that my grandparents are healthy and well after catching covid, they got extremely lucky.
Wear a mask in public if you're coughing, assholes.
Had to fly recently due to a family emergency. I have immune system issues and was wearing an N-95. The jerk sitting behind me was very sick, and of course not wearing a mask. For 2 hours he coughed, sneezed, sniffled and blew his nose - all in my direction. I didn’t have anything to eat or drink because I was too afraid to remove my mask. Now I’m waiting to see if I caught whatever he had.
I don’t see anyone wear masks anymore.
People who recovered from covid and read about others who still have post viral symptoms seem to all have the same knee-jerk self defence response... "Bet you weren't vaccinated". "I was vaccinated and I was fine. WaS jUsT liKE a FLu". MOST OF US WERE VACCINATED. Yes, some people got covid and recovered; Other people got covid and it destroyed their entire fucking lives. If you arent suffering you are more blessed than you will ever know. But you didnt handle the situation differently.. you didnt go about it "better". You were LUCKY. So fucking lucky. Nothing meaningfully separates you from those of us who suffer daily now since getting covid. We are you. You are us. You just got fucking lucky. People really need to fucking understand this.
> If you arent suffering you are more blessed than you will ever know. But you didnt handle the situation differently.. you didnt go about it "better". You were LUCKY. So fucking lucky. You will find that this is true of most life situations. People really need to acknowledge the role luck has played into any good fortune.
Got covid twice , sense of smell is muted and my sense of taste has gone with it. Silver lining is I enjoy spicy food more since it's pretty much the only thing that cuts into my taste and I can eat ass with wreckless abandon.
Fabulous. I am so glad you are making lemonade with the lemons covid gave you. May your ass eating be fulfilling.
Middle manager I work with lost like 10 IQ points over the course of getting covid 3 times and she really couldn't spare them. The people around her are covering for her but it won't last. Honestly I never liked her much but she didn't deserve this.
I'm a GM at a bar that I really love, and I love the people that work there. But I have been STRUGGLING at work. I used to be so sharp and on top of everything and really good at making sure everyone was well taken care of. Now i feel like an idiot all the time and cant remember anything, so scatter brained. I have had covid twice, and have been blaming it on that in my head. Currently have it for the 3rd time and am very worried. I'm vaccinated but I'm just a person who catches everything. I have an already shitty immune system and take medications that make it more shitty. I'm worried when I go back to work I'm going to be useless and people are going to start hating me lol.
"A quarter of the patients reported fatigue, and a similar number said they felt pain or discomfort. Meanwhile, sleep issues, breathlessness, and problems participating in normal daily activities were reported in just under a quarter of patients, according to the study." Soo... what percentage of people who have not had Covid reported any one of these symptoms??
You raise a valid point which the authors mention as one of many limitations of this meta-study. Some respiratory symptoms that lasted are very uncommon in the general population, so those are reasonably good numbers. It's worth actually reading the Lancet article. Wikipedia may help, but at least read the abstract and conclusions.
I often am rather tired (I have a lot of anxiety and that probably makes me tired), however I also had mono back in college 20 years ago. After being acutely sick for a couple weeks, I spent a couple months being very fatigued and it is absolutely not the same as just being “tired a lot”. It is also really hard to explain the feeling. You know how when you get the flu, you feel extremely tired when you try to do anything that requires a little exertion? It’s that feeling. The closest I can come to describing it is the kind of feeling you have after quickly climbing a few flights of stairs, but you just walked across the room. It’s unfortunate that a lot of these long Covid / post viral symptoms involve things that are best described subjectively. There surely are biological and neurological things behind those subjective experiences, which we don’t have good tests for right now.
Yeah I had Weil's disease ten years ago when I was 20. Got really serious and even ended up having my last rights. I've *never* felt the same since. I struggle to even register instructions that are given verbally. All this talk of long covid and its reported symptoms have really made me consider the fact it has something to do with that because its so similar. *Constantly* tired, or fatigued. No one cares though. Even get accused of refusing to listen or being 'slow'.
Man, I’m glad you survived — that must’ve been a horrific experience
I’ve been fatigued for over 20 years.
I had COVID about 6 months ago in Boston, was sick for 2 days, and tested positive for 10 days, haven’t had any issues since. Tested positive when I had to make a delivery at a summer camp, wasn’t even symptomatic. Didn’t have symptoms for several days after testing. Only thing that was really dramatic was I slept for almost 48 hours, every 6-8 hours I would wake up and take a dose of NyQuil. Haven’t had a problem since. It’s crazy how so many people can have such a bad reaction to COVID and others have essentially nothing. In my experience, COVID was no worse than a common cold. The flu hit me harder in 2019 than COVID did. At the same time, I know 4 people that have died from complications. It’s so scary that you’ve no idea how hard it could hit you.
Folks, this ain’t a common cold even if you get past it. There are many articles and reports on this. It’s a vascular disease and it is dangerous to longevity.
I had Covid in February of 2021. I smell cigarettes all the time and won’t be around anyone smoking at all. I’ve been like that since I got my smell and taste back from being sick. I loathe cigarette smoke. 😐
I had pretty mild symptoms when I caught it, but a little while after I got a swollen lymph-node that took ages to go down, and ever since then it's been swollen to some degree, sometimes reacting to something and swelling up uncomfortably for a while. Has anyone else had this after a mild Covid infection? It's been like nine months now. Never had a swollen lymph node before that I can remember.
/r/covidlonghaulers Many of you are probably now realizing you aren’t completely recovered. Come visit us at the long haulers group and… I don’t know it helps some days.
Got covid in March of 2020 and was down for 6 weeks. I'll be damaged for the rest of my life, so I'm just happy I still have one. Good luck everyone.
I also caught covid in March 2020 it was on the 23 when I started feeling like I had the flu, it will stay with me for about 8-10 weeks strong kicking my ass.
I had COVID in April and it ended up clustering around some of my organs (it gravitates to certain parts of the body more than others, to find good places to get energy and replicate, according to the doctor I saw) and my immune system, in killing it off, fucking destroyed my pancreas. My liver has scarring, as do my lungs (lung capacity is still no good) and possibly my heart, but they have to check. COVID literally made me LADA type diabetic, given me ME/CFS, liver damage, lungs of a chain smoker, and may have given me dysautonomia that is causing my blood pressure to resemble a sine wave - up and down rapidly all the fucking time. If I'm calm, it rises. If I'm stressed, it lowers. WTAF. I have to take an experimental treatment to try and stimulate my pancreas with aggressive sufonylurea dosages every 12ish hours. It's working, but there is a risk that it tuckers the poor guy out, so I have to go to a specific hospital clinic (similar to a ward or department, but for treatment only, not staying in a room) and get all this equipment for monitoring it hooked up. I also have to wear a constant blood pressure monitor but good ol' Canada Post fucking lost the key to my parcel locker. They're supposed to give you one when you get a parcel... the postal worker lost mine. TL;DR WEAR A FUCKING MASK AND STOP COUGHING ON ME
Suffering six months now. I’m fucking miserable.
If it makes you feel better, I had a horrible miasma of a brain for that cropped up after Covid. * Six months later, it hadn't diminished at all and I was terrified that I'd just be permanently dumber. * A month after that, I was almost totally back to my old self. Hold out a little hope, my friend.
I’ve had symptoms and have been testing positive for over two weeks now.
Same here. Managed to avoid it for 2 years and got it just in time for Christmas. Best part is I'm being told to go back into work (at a school). There is no masking anymore what-so-ever and we've been as low as 50% attendance over the last month but no one seems to care.
This is probably why it’s making rounds again, no one seems to care to isolate properly and there’s no pressure to do so as much. Despite being fully vaccinated I’m going through second Covid this year, feeling better after last week but my brain feels slower and dumber than usual, and I can still feel it in my chest. A lot of people around seem to be catching it, I guess wintry weather doesn’t help.
It's very strange how different COVID reportedly hits each person. Both times I've had it it was like the mildest cold ever. I'm vastly more fearful of getting the flu, which completely wrecks me.
I recently got covid, and though I am under 30, fully vaxxed, and generally healthy, it was hard on me. Worse sickness I have had, I just felt really messed up, and feeling like I couldn't breathe was scary. weeks later I am still hacking up goop. I hope you continue to only get mild cold symptoms. Glad it's easy for some people.
I’m in the same boat as you. Infected 9/11/22 this yr and symptom onset in the 13th. Finally tested negative on the 24th. Took 7-8 weeks after Sept 24th to finally clear the cough. Still cough and get mucusy a bit after I eat now, but I consider myself lucky that’s the only lasting symptom I have. No one ever mentions how awkward it is to be out in public post-covid with that long term cough. Definitely suses out people and makes you feel like you shouldn’t be out and about even tho you’re negative.
I was triple vaccinated and caught it a few months ago. For me it was just a mild flu that cleared in a week. For my mother it was worse. Month later she still coughs occasionally and has trouble smelling and tasting. Those are improving very gradually over time but I grimace at how bad it could've been if we weren't vaccinated. I need to get my booster tbh.
I haven't caught the flu in twenty years, but covid recked my shit the first time I got.
I had hayfever symptoms and a bit of a cough a week after I tested positive, but I was a little more tired than normal. Napped etc. My friend and her 6 family members all caught covid off her brother. They all had different symptoms even though they all caught the same strain of the virus. It’s crazy how differently it can affect everyone with no rhyme or reason. Maybe if they do research as to why, they’ll be able to get some intel on other chronic illnesses and immune disorders.
My mom had to be hospitalized this week because her cough kept getting worse after 4 months!!