The 'Rona

I got COVID for the first time this week - three years into the pandemic and three months after I left clinical medicine. It seems ironic that despite all the time spent caring for COVID-positive patients (and my family, who all got it earlier in the pandemic), it was a regional meeting with other family physicians that finally did it. Figures. That’s the ‘rona.

As a physician, there is this head-game you play when you experience minor signs of being unwell (or at least I do). “I am NOT getting sick. This {scratchy throat/mild fatigue/slight nausea/headache/fill-in-the-blank symptom} is only because I am {breathing airplane air/didn’t sleep well/ate something funky/haven’t had caffeine/fill-in-the-blank reason}.” And almost always, you win the game: the symptom resolves quickly, you feel perfectly well again, and you keep moving. Because there are things. to. do.

Bleh.

This week I lost the game. Minor symptoms on the plane ride home turned into “oh yuck” overnight and the rapid antigen test was brilliantly positive. Sigh. The ‘rona.

Being sick is not my thing, so it’s fortunate I have a robust immune system. The last time I had a cold was in June of 2021 (not the ‘rona). This is lucky for me, and those around me, because I’m not very good at being ill. I am grouchy and annoyed. I hate having to ask anyone to do anything for me. I don’t appreciate not being able to operate at full-steam-ahead speed. And I am impatient with the time it takes to get better.

Perhaps the thing I dreaded most, though, was telling all my family medicine friends - not only did I get COVID, I had unknowingly exposed them to COVID in turn. Ug. #TyphoidJen was not a hashtag I was trying to launch. Thank heavens for #FamilyMedicineLove (a much better hashtag!) - not only were people gracious about my potential germ-spreading, they offered support, nudged me into the smart decision to get an RX for Paxlovid (+ finish the entire course), and checked back through the week to make sure I was doing ok.

And I am ok.

The really bothersome symptoms (sore throat, exhaustion, “brain mush”) were brief and quickly replaced in my attention with boredom and the Paxlovid side effect of terrible taste. I am grateful that the weather has allowed me to get out and walk in the fresh air and sunshine each day - being able to do so likely saved my sanity. I am appreciative of the excuse to binge-(re)watch the first two seasons of Ted Lasso in anticipation of season three. And I am REALLY thankful that today is day 6, my rapid antigen test is back to negative, and I can be out and about a little more with a mask.

I learned something: sometimes, I need to slow down to speed up. My default mode is to press on. No sleep? Keep going. Feel stressed? Keep going. Get sick? Keep going. Things usually work themselves out somewhere along the line as you move forward. This week there were moments when I could not. My body and brain just stopped serving me, and the only thing I could do was take a nap. In the middle of the day. Seriously?! Seriously. Oh ‘rona…it took you to help me learn this lesson.

I always knew it was a question of when, not if, I would get COVID. Once it became clear that being vaccinated and boosted offered significant protection against severe illness and long-term effects, I eased back into life patterns more typical of pre-COVID days: eating out, traveling to meetings, less mask wearing. I am fortunate that my good baseline health offers the option to take a little more risk in exchange for the good-vibe feeling that my world is returning to normal. I am a glass-half-full person: now I have an additional layer of natural immunity to cocoon me against the next exposure to COVID. And I’m a realist: that exposure is gonna happen, and I’ll get COVID again someday. But for now, I’ll hope to keep my distance from the ‘rona.