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A quick COVID check in
Well, friends… it finally happened. Last week, I tested positive for COVID. My symptoms were pretty mild to begin with, but my doctor still strongly recommended Paxlovid (a COVID-specific antiviral). I’m still testing positive, but I feel quite well. I feel grateful to have made it this far into the pandemic before catching it, now that we have more knowledge and treatment options available.
It’s been a while since we did a COVID check-in. Have you had it? Have you avoided it so far? What are the current guidelines or restrictions in your area? To what degree does COVID affect your life right now?
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11 Replies
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Jenny, I know this response is a bit late but I thought it might be interesting to discuss how we are navigating the whole Covid world now. This is my experience.
I wear a mask whenever I feel the need. I feel the need in the grocery store. I feel the need in the movie theatre. I feel the need in the restaurant (although that one is very tricky). When I wear a mask, I could care less what anyone around me thinks. I do this because I chose to do this. That is enough reason. I want to live my life but I want to do it as responsibly as possible.
No one in my family wears a mask anymore, including my wife. As a result, I have become more physically distant from my family whenever we are in a closed environment. It is a sacrifice (and very tricky when it comes to my wife), but I feel I have no choice if I am to be responsible with my health. This is a challenge. But we work on it. I must live my life and they must live theirs. The trick is to bridge the difference and hold on to our relationships.
At first, I was a bit nonplussed at the non-mask wearing because everyone knows that my lungs are suspect at best. They also know that if they are infected then they could infect me. This fact does not carry the day. They have become desensitized to Covid and regard it as no different than the flu or cold bugs. And they might be right. I’m not immunocompromised and I am vaccinated and boosted (like everyone in my family). In fact, I am the only member of my family who has not tested positive for Covid. They look at the odds of survival and they see me as resilient enough to withstand any possible infection. It all adds up to one conclusion if you weigh the risk versus benefit of wearing a mask.
The reality is that people must live life, not just exist. My grandchildren must grow with less fear in their lives. Masks have done a lot of damage to children, and they need to be free to develop without the constant concern of Covid. So, this is our new reality. I accept it and I move on. But I move on my way.
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Hi, I haven’t had covid yet but my husband currently has it ( day 5 and still testing positive) It is incredibly nerve wracking living in the same house and isolating from each other! Has anyone else had this experience? Glad to hear you had a mild case, Jenny!
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Annette, what a stressful situation! I hope your husband recovers fully and without complication, and I hope you stay COVID-free!
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I have 2 kids with CF, Will and Sarah. Will was the first in our family to test positive back in Oct of 2020. He was completely a-symptomatic. We only had him tested because he traveled in a car with a friend that tested positive. Will remained positive for over 3 weeks with no symptoms. His sister, Sarah, has yet to test positive. We have our fingers crossed that she’ll remain healthy. I kinda feel like God (or the universe, whichever your prefer) thought the folks with CF have enough to deal with so they don’t get very sick if they contract the sickness. Just my opinion.
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Christina, remaining positive for three weeks is so interesting to me! Especially with no symptoms. When my daughter first had COVID, she was asymptomatic and nobody else in the house caught it. Hopefully this illness moves out of your home quickly and without complication.
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My wife and I both have had COVID and she had the shot and I did not. I was positive for two days and she was positive for a week. My symptoms were very mild and hers were more pronounced. Thankfully all is well now and this was the start of last year. We both wore masks during the onset of COVID but now we don’t. Neither of us has been sick sense. She has had the second shot now and I have not. My doctor on my CF Team encouraged me to get the jab but even he had resviorations about taking the jab, but something inside of me kept telling me no and that I would be alright.
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Ron, I am so glad to hear that you’re both doing okay now!
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Jenny,
I’m glad you proposed this forum. I’m hoping that my contribution is taken as one that has worked for me and that I’m not endorsing non-masking….only sharing my approach in the case that anybody sees the rationale.
I live in an area of Florida where I never saw a soul wear a mask from day one. In fact, our area caught the attention of the entire Southeast as an area to go to that wasn’t locked down and didn’t have tough mask mandates.
I was diagnosed with CF at 18mos and I’m now 53; married and have two wonderful, biological daughters due to gains in in vitro reproductive medicine.
I never wore a mask outside of mandated airline travel and I’m happy to report that I never got Covid. I looked at it as an exercise in futility being that I have two daughters in travel sports that either practiced or play away games all throughout Covid case amplifications. I could’ve done everything right and still caught it just by touching the staircase handrails in my own house.
I chose instead to interact with microbes, bacteria, viruses. I knew I was taking chances but chose other ways to stay at the top of my game: daily workouts; solid diet (including only one drink when I went out with friends to any one of our 5 live music venues that never shut down); and plenty of vitamins C and D.
I tore my shoulder at the gym in September of 2020 and was told by the surgeons that that wouldn’t do the rotator surgery on me because I was an anesthesia risk. We struck a deal where I agreed to quarantine for 2 weeks in exchange for the surgery….and I complied 100% with that order. I moved into the guest house and stopped going to the gym.
I will tell you that my health fell apart during that 2 week quarantine. I accomplished a lot of binge watching but health fell quickly. I never denied the horrible effects of Covid as I was routinely sick for 7-10 days with the regular flu when I was younger.
I just feel that the withdrawal from a healthy lifestyle wasn’t worth the tradeoff to avoid the flu. Our entire area of the Florida Panhandle has been accused of not believing that Covid exists. That statement couldn’t be further from truth. The rest of world just loves to use the nomenclature of “Redneck Riviera” and lament that we aren’t educated or conventional. Actually, my viewpoint, and that of all of my friends/peers/neighbors is one of
“That virus is everywhere, and you are never going to outrun it…so why try so hard?”
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Luckily, neither my wife or I have experienced covid as we are currently in year four of this pandemic. Hopefully you have all avoided covid in the last few months!
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I almost never post or reply, but this one strikes a nerve since Covid seems to have dictated our lives for so long now (in large or small ways, depending on each person’s approach). I am 53 – late diagnosis at age 12 due to rare mutations. However, I have “moderate to severe” lung involvement now, so Covid quite literally scared me out of my wits. I do agree with another post that diet, exercise and other means of taking care of one’s body and mind help tremendously; however, I suspect most (if not nearly all) of those who have posted have the added benefit of modulators. I do not, so I knew I’d be 100% on my own and hope my body would hold up. As a result, I quite nearly retreated to hermit stage for at least the first year. My husband and I (no kids) masked absolutely everywhere until very recently when I finally decided places like Lowes or other large open warehouse type areas seemed to be an acceptable risk. We are both as vaccinated as the CDC allows at this point as well. Nearly 4 years in and neither of us have had Covid. We live in the South where only about 50% vaccinated at all and almost no one masked up. (My own family refused to vaccinate or mask up- 3 of them died due to complications from Covid). To put it mildly, Covid has been a hot button in our family and within our circle of friends.
I hope I don’t regret it, but just within the last week I have relaxed a little. My husband and I had our first “date night” this week and actually went inside and ate in a restaurant (as opposed to drive-thru). It was delightful! It felt like I’d awakened from a horrible dream! I’ll tip toe back into life a little bit at a time and hope nothing new raises its ugly head to take that freedom away again. I’m not so terrified of death, but I know enough that I don’t want to go that way, if I can prevent it.
I wish you all good health and happiness. Thanks for sharing your lives on this site. It really does help me not feel so alone in all this.
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Kathy, I too do not have modulators so, keeping safe is all we can do. Hopefully you and your husband are able to enjoy more dates together.
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