Long haul Covid-19

What this disease taught me. After 108 days I know my body. I feel the shift in temperature. Only the slightest rise or drop is noticeable to me. I am usually low in temperature, this constitution that physicians laugh about and discard. My GP asks about the exact number and I feel an urge to lie, to say that it is over 38, 37,7 would not suffice. A normal day, pre Corona 36,5 was me. I understand that research about human fever is not the most appealing topic, YET. Although I am one of them, the physicians, I was taught the same. Corona made me think again. Fever is better described as the rise of temperature in a body with one degree. Usually people notice this and feel discomfort.

I know what 37,9 means. It means that the virus is not at rest. Or that my system is uneasy. I was too active in the days passed. Christmas made my temperature rise. Even though I made no effort, I was just a participant. My children were here, making me laugh and eager to take a short walk with them on christmas day.

I no longer control my body or, I need to control my body in order not to get worse. I need to pace myself into a person that is not me. Slowing down, stop doing the ordinary things.

Cooking is a problem, hanging the laundry, staying up late to read a book, playing with my kids, anything that before Covid took my breath away is out of the question. Bringing in the morning paper makes me want to sit down and take a rest. My usual exercise is just a memory, a dream away.

Yes, it is hard to believe that I have no strength even to work more than two hours a day at this time. 108 days ago I was well, I worked full time at a hospital ward, planning ahead. I wanted to participate, I still do.

Is this the new me? Do I need to get a job that lets me stay at home and be still? Sitting in a chair answering calls about defective garden supplies? A call center girl, is that the new me?

Right now I wonder if I will ever be rid of this virus or it´s repercussions. The worst part of being infected is that we know nothing about this in the long run. I would gladly have been infected with any other known microbe, maybe not ebola, TBE, or HIV but still. To have a reasonable good forecast of what to expect. That would ease my mind, make it easier to sleep and plan for the future.

I am so lucky to live in a country with medical insurance for all, tax funded. I get ”salary” from the state up to a certain point that is quite high, I do not have to sell my house, not for the first 180 days anyways. I will not lose my job and I have savings. We can stay afloat a couple of years without me working at full speed.

But for others, in countries like the USA…..or worse, the undeveloped countries that live off our ability to consume….scary. And in the case of the USA it is quite hard to take in.

The vaccine gives me hope. But it will not eradicate the virus. It will live on. The long haulers in the world will for a long and at the moment an incalculable time be off grid.

What will happen to us in the future, 15 years from now, nobody knows and I dare not think of it. A great cost of us all when we cannot work. In our country we talk only of the deaths. A great loss 8279 over the age of 70 in a population of approximately 10 million. Below that 248…..Someone calculated that the oldest died three months earlier than expected. Yes in a terrible way….but they had long lives most of them.

The big cost for our community will surely not be the deaths of people 80+. The cost of me and my neighbour, pregnant mother of 2 in her thirties and embolies in her lungs…..all of us nobody talks of that. This will for sure be the worst challenge of all.

This is not a really deadly virus although people have died in millions, if we measure in suffering an illness, Qualys and Dalys the biggest problem is all affected that does not get well after three or eight months, the ones that should be at work, play with their kids, work at hospitals of at nurserys…..this will be the big cost.

My worst fear now is that my husband gets the same as I did. That he will nor recover after three or four weeks. That none of us will have the strength to care for our children properly. Who would like to come here and help out….? None I suspect and I get that. This virus that China generated, not a good thing.

When I was 18 I visited China, then a very closed country. I saw the animal markets. We were all disgusted.

China…..will they be held accountable?