Category: Documentary

Summary (as of June 1): 7 days in and I am ready to declare I am generally done with COVID for now. Some lingering sniffles and occasional congestion – but when don’t I have that? With that said my plan is to stop with the updates unless I encounter some sort of setback, in which case this post will be updated. Thanks for caring.

Yep – tested positive on Saturday (May 27) after returning from a business trip to Boston. I am chronicling my experience again, as I did here because I am finding it informative to reflect on my previous experience to better manage my expectations. As an example, I feel pretty good – so far it’s been mild. A few hours here and there of feeling run down interspersed with feeling pretty normal. So, I am hoping this will be a mild experience and things will be normal in a week or less. However! (yes, a dramatic however)… if you look at my previous post (see link above) you will see that my first week then was pretty mild as well. But from there I had some weeks that were pretty crappy. Perhaps I pushed it too hard before (I will be more cautious this time); or perhaps my body will just deal with this variety better than last time (only time will tell).

Day 1 (Friday, May 26): Hmmm, is this the onset of a cold?

I flew back from Boston on Thursday. On Friday (at some point – I don’t recall when) I noticed an irritated swelling somewhere in the rear part of my nasal passage. The sort of thing that makes you think you’re partner will deal with a lot of snoring during the night – so I warned Leslie.

Day 2: Darn, it might be spreading.

At bedtime I crawled into bed and and Leslie voiced an alarm, “oh my, you have quite a rash on your back!” She then consulted Google to see what might cause such a rash of this appearance; two causes were identified: Scarlet Fever (STREP) and COVID-19. With that said, I decided to do the home test: a solid positive.

Day 3: Symptoms are Mild, Gotta Work in the Yard as Planned

Feeling pretty good on day 3, so I worked hard in the yard as planned for this weekend – about 5 hours or so. Then I got tired, so quit for the day. A little congestion, a little coughing, but not much more.

Day 4 (Happy Memorial Day): Slept Well (after a Benadryl); Still Feeling Pretty Good

Feeling OK. Did a little more work in the yard for about an hour. A little more tired than usual – think I’ll take a nap.

Day 5 (Tuesday): Back to Work

I don’t want to get ahead of things, but aside from a little light-headedness I am feeling pretty good. I was starting to get a deep cough yesterday evening which concerned me – thinking this was going to move into my lungs, but that has not materialized and I am very happy about that! Hopefully today will continue as is.

Day 6: Getting Optimistic

Yesterday did continue as I hoped – no real down turns aside from getting tired and some minor coughing here and there. And this morning I am feeling decent; a little groggy and lightheaded perhaps, but that’s almost normal. I still feel the presence of the virus in my sinuses and my lungs but I feel like things are going better than they were last August. As I was yesterday – hoping it continues as is (or, dare I wish, even better).

Fifteen Days Six Weeks of Covid

If you read my post on Portugal you may already know that Leslie and I brought a guest home with us – the COVID virus. I am writing this post to be informative for those curious to gather anecdotal evidence about what it’s like to get COVID. Here’s the timeline of my experience to date.

UPDATE at 6 Weeks: The information below was written in real time for the first 15 days, when, near the end I felt I was better enough to consider myself near done. However, now at the 6 week mark, I will tell you that weeks 3-5 were more difficult for this asthmatic blogger than the first couple weeks were. While I kept active throughout, when I felt up to it, I was struggling with the dizzies and difficulty breathing for more than half the time during those latter weeks. As of today – the six-week point (9/11/22) – this was the second day my breathing was somewhat normal, and my light-headedness was almost non-existent. I truly hope this is my last update on the subject. Be well.

Day 1: Woke up feeling dryness in my throat. Thought it was perhaps a result of sleeping with my mouth open, or perhaps some bad air quality from a nearby fire. The dryness was very mild and I could notice it when I thought about it, but it was mostly off my mind.

Day 2: (Walking around Porto) Just like day 1, but the dryness was slightly more than it was the previous day.

Day 3: (Train ride to Lisbon) More of the same, but on this day I took measures to stay indoors incase the outside air was really the problem.

Day 4: (Flight home) Feels more like a cold that got progressively more so as the flight progressed. Seemed to enter my lungs more and irritated my nasal passage more. Started to suspect a cold or COVID for the first time. Took a COVID test as soon as I got home: Positive.

Day 5: Woke up feeling some energy, so took a morning bike ride. Feeling like COVID was going to be super mild and go away quickly. Was able to work with good energy until about 3pm – then felt like crap for the rest of the day.

Day 6: Feeling like a real cold – no energy. Worked some, but didn’t feel good most of the day.

Day 7: More like Day 5 – took a morning bike ride and felt some real strength toward the end of the ride, but good feelings dwindled quickly and was dragging the rest of the day. Felt pretty bad that evening.

Day 8: (Saturday) – woke up feeling horrible. Was it the Benadryl? Was it COVID making me feel that way? Need to get the yard work done, so did that, but otherwise lots of nasal dripping and dry (unproductive) coughing.

Day 9: (The day I started to author this post) Slept pretty well. Woke up feeling better than the day before. Took a nice hour-long walk. Will see how the day goes. 5:50PM… kept somewhat active today, though energy level was pretty low most of the day. Nothing too serious, more nasal congestion dripping into the bronchial ways – clearing my throat all day. Nevertheless, I thought I would do a home test to see if I can get some indication that I am free and clear of the virus.

No such luck. Think I’ll sip some Johnny Walker Black.

Tomorrow’s another day.

Day 10: Woke up this morning feeling pretty normal. A little nasal congestion. Almost no coughing. PulseOx reading was 95. I haven’t mentioned PulseOx yet, mostly because I am not very knowledgeable on the topic. I will say that yesterday my average was in the low 90’s and on day 8 it was consistently at or slightly below 90. I am glad to see some improvement on that today.

Day 15: Days 11-14 were will filled with congestion, coughing, breathing tightness, low blood-oxygen, and a little bit of feeling OK in between. On day 13 I called the doctor to see if I should get attention, but the advice was to keep doing what I’m doing (symptoms described are common, and add some Zyrtec to the mix. On day 14 I nearly killed myself with a 28 mile bike ride – all good except I was ready to pass-out during the last mile or so – I think mostly heat exhaustion. I call it an exorcism. Well, it may have worked – today (day 15) I woke up feeling 95%, and stayed at that level for most of the day (it’s late afternoon as I write this). With that said, I am ready to call this the last entry for this Covid-19 experience. I prefer not to do that again, and count my blessings that it could have been worse.