I GOT COVID 19

For most of my adult life, I tend to get a couple colds a year.  When the outside temperature goes all wonky, my body just seems to open up, take on a virus, and get sick.  I remember back when I was "young" (i.e. my twenties, when I thought I was "old") it was just once a year.  If I didn't get sick in the spring I could bet that I'd get sick in the fall.  But that single year sickness only lasted a short while and it soon became twice a year.


A couple years back I complained to my doc about it and how the colds were getting worse as I grew older.  He said it might be both a cold and a seasonal allergy that I didn't have as a child and young adult.  So for that spring's cold he prescribed me singulair.  It's primarily prescribed to people for asthma prevention but its also widely used to prevent or lessen allergies.  And it worked!  I used it for a couple months and the cold got better.  When I got sick again that autumn, the doc suggested I just stay on it year round as I wasn't experiencing side effects and it would help with both my spring and autumn "colds".

Thankfully it's done just that.  I still get sick multiple times a year but they're rarely debilitating.  Just a slight sore throat, some congestion, some coughing.... nothing major.  I just feel "sick" for a few days, maybe a week, then get on with life.  I don't even miss work for it.  But this year obviously presents a problem.

This past Monday I was feeling a slight sore throat and a bit of shortness of breath (SOB).  The SOB was upon exertion but didn't actually add up to me gasping for breath... just breathing a little harder.  Honestly, nothing to concern myself with except I have to fill out a sheet every day that states I'm not experiencing any cough (worsening cough... I'm a smoker so I always cough), SOB, or sore throat.

I lied.

If I answer yes to those questions or have a fever, I get sent home.   I then have to stay home for a week and can only return if I have no symptoms for three days.  This isn't corona virus.  This is my semi-annual cold.  Nothing to worry about.  But I WAS feeling sick and the nurses around me noticed.

Tuesday I lied again as the SOB and slight sore throat were still there.  Not worse, not better, just there.  But the nurses were all asking if I felt better that day.  I saw on their faces true concern.  Not concern for me, but concern that I had this vicious and incredibly infections disease.

Wednesday I woke up with the same symptoms, but also could add a worsening cough and a feverish feeling.  Now, feeling feverish isn't having a fever.  A fever is an objective measurement of body temperature rising above 100 degrees.  Feeling feverish is feeling hot, then cold, then hot again.  Feeling chills in a warm room.  Sweating in a cold room.  It's often a precursor to an actual fever and could be a sign of your body fighting off a fever.  I felt that.

If it wasn't for this honest and true scare, I'd completely shrug these feelings off.  This is just my spring cold coming on.  It'll last a few days, might get to some bad chest or head congestion, but nothing else and I'd likely just work through it.  But there is a bad virus out there and medically I can't say that my symptoms are not signs of corona virus.  So I was responsible.

The department has made an arrangement for our employees to get rapid testing.  There's only one place in the state, but you can get an appointment through HR where you'll just drive up, get swabbed, and get a result in 5 to 10 minutes.  So I called up my supervisor and told her what I was experiencing.  I told her I would get HR to get me that test and then just be in late, as when it showed these symptoms weren't Covid 19, it would prove that it's just a cold.

Well, anything involving HR is just prone to tomfuckery.  I sent an email to HR (it has to be via email as they're all working from home) stating my symptoms and a desire for the rapid test.  Their response, 4 hours later, was that they didn't know of any such test and that I should go home (mind you, I wasn't AT work) and stay home for 7 days.  I could return to work once I was symptom free for 3 days.  When I pressed them on a test, even a regular speed test that takes days, they said that I could return with a negative result AND three days of being symptom free.

FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK

I didn't want time off of work.  I needed to be there.  I only involved them because they had to schedule my test and now not only were they fucking me by making me stay away for DAYS, but also couldn't get me the GOD DAMNED TEST!!!!

Thankfully the city I live in is big enough to have a thorough system in place.  My doctor's office is closed, so I called up their COVID 19 phone number and explained that I had mild symptoms, was a healthcare worker, and worked in an environment with COVID 19 positive patients.  They scheduled me a videoconference appointment with a doctor for the next day but also got me an appointment at a drive up testing facility in town for that afternoon.  The results would take 1 to 3 days, but it's still better than waiting a full on week.

So I got the test result and was reminded that I should isolate myself.  And that's where this gets a little crazy.  Yes, I knew in my mind that this was just my common cold.  But my work was telling me to treat it like this deadly disease.  My healthcare system was telling me to treat it like this deadly disease.  The nurses at the testing facility were telling me to treat it like this deadly disease.  I'm sorry, but you just can't be bombarded with information like that and NOT start thinking it's that deadly disease.

So for the next 24 hours I was half confident that this was just my spring cold and half scared out of my mind that this was COVID 19, that I'd infected my brothers, that my symptoms would last a couple weeks, that they'd get worse, and that I might end up in the hospital on a ventilator and dying from it.  My video visit with the doc didn't change any of that, especially when he told me that the new World Health Organization recomendations were to have 2 negative test results within 24 hours to show it's not covid.

Thankfully, work doesn't require that.  Later, on Thursday afternoon, I got the results back.  Negative.  I had a cold, nothing more.

Now I just have to wait for three days of "symptom free".  I'm putting that in quotes as I'm most certainly NOT symptom free today, but I need to get back to work and have evidence that this is NOT COVID.  I'm going to claim symptom free today through Sunday and should be able to return to work on Monday.






Oh, and two nurses quit, three new nurses were sent up to the covid 19 positive unit while four were returned to us.  My schedule is blown up and I need to start over again, including 7 shifts of overtime that need to be filled up TODAY!  So even though I'm home sick, I'm still going to be working.

Oh, and one quick note on nurses.  I hear a lot that nurses are heroes.  That we put our lives on the line and deserve respect and admiration for that.  I honestly don't believe we deserve that worshipful respect as this is our job.  We work among the sick.  That's what we do.  I completely understand nurses who are scared of getting sick and bringing that sickness home, but again.... that's the job.

I've lost complete respect for four nurses I worked with.  Three are wonderful nurses, and wonderful people (one sucked both as a nurse AND as a person).  They all wanted to leave as they were scared of getting sick and had people at home that needed to be protected.  They did this with no notice and expected to have their job back when "this was all over".  I'm sorry, but fuck you.  They should damned well be able to suck it up like everybody else, use their nursing knowledge to keep themselves and their loved ones safe, and continue on to do their job.  IF they can't do that, then like any good employee they should give us 2 weeks notice.  Their absence is going to hurt and inconvenience the rest of our nurses.  But nope... they just sent us emails, voicemails, or called us and told us they were done.

Technically I haven't had any nurses quit, but only because they think they'll get their jobs back when this is done.  In reality, their actions are the same as quitting without notice.  They told me they couldn't be here and they walked away.  In what world do they think they could return to work?  They failed as an employee AND as a nurse.



And one last note, I got interrupted writing this by a call from my doctor's office.  I had a quick video visit with him and he's given me the okay to return to work.  With the doctor's criteria and work's criteria I should be able to return on Monday.



And before I publish this... one last little bit.  I can't help but think "THIS IS NOT OVER".  Yeah, I just experienced a cold and it was pissy and stupid that I had to miss work and work from home.  But this is still going on.  We've had 6 positive cases at my facility and I've interacted with almost all of them.  We had two more get testing either late last night or early this morning.  We've now had two employees get positive results.  This is still spreading, and I'm still at the same risk for getting COVID 19.

Fuck my life.