Disclaimer: The contents of this post reflect my experience alone and are provided for entertainment purposes only. If you are affected by any of the issues in this post, please consult with a qualified healthcare provider.
It seems almost inconceivable to me now that my life before contracting Coronavirus and developing Covid-19 and then Long-Covid was so different. Since forming Long-Covid, my world has become infinitely smaller, affecting all areas of my life.
It began in the middle of December 2021. So, in many ways, it started long before I contracted the virus. I am asthmatic, so, as a family, we were cautious - knowing that without a vaccine or effective treatments, the impact on someone with underlying health conditions could be severe.
How was lockdown for me?
In the UK, we had three national lockdowns which we followed diligently; I was fortunate in that I have been working from home since the beginning of 2019. Supermarkets delivered food to the house, and we exercised either in the garden or when allowed outside the house in the open air. We hid away from our families and friends, remaining social distanced even when not strictly required of us.
Lockdown wasn't much fun, but it felt necessary. We needed to wait for vaccines and treatments to be discovered to protect the NHS and our health. Unfortunately, we couldn't avoid lockdown, and by mid-2021, we felt pretty pleased that we had caught it and received the first two doses of the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine.
How did Coronavirus affect me?
I suspect we picked up the Delta variant from my daughter's school. We had been to events in the run-up to Christmas days before I tested positive on a lateral flow test. However, no one in those groups subsequently contracted the virus. However, a couple of my daughter's fellow students tested positive in the days after I tested positive.
It was bound to happen eventually. In practice, it wasn't too bad, significantly worse than a cold, and for a few days, my asthma felt worse than it ever had. However, my saturation (SpO2) remained within normal ranges, and after about a week, I felt much better.
I pushed through more than I should have; I helped run a virtual Christmas Party and worked as much as possible. In hindsight, this was probably a mistake, and I didn't give my body a chance to recover from the virus. But, ultimately, I think this is what leads to Long-COVID.
How did Long-COVID affect me?
My illness was marked by fatigue from the outset; I think most people find fatigue part of any viral infection. However, ten days after testing positive, I only felt fatigued - the cough had gone along with the brain fog and the shortness of breath.
I took some holiday over the Christmas break; it felt good to rest. However, I still felt tired when I returned to work in January 2022. I was sleeping more than I ever had and never felt rested. Nevertheless, I tried to be kind and relax as much as possible.
I took another week of work in February as annual leave; I needed to rest. I was exhausted - I hoped this would be the break I needed to return to normal. Unfortunately, I was wrong; returning to work again left me exhausted. Worse still, it was getting worse.
Over February and March, I had a string of colds, stomach bugs and a sinus infection. Finally, enough was enough, so I went to speak to the doctor ten weeks after initially contracting Coronavirus.
The impact was huge; there were days that lifting a 1L water bottle from the floor was too much for my arms. It felt like all of the energy in my body had been drained.
Diagnosis
Batteries of blood tests and answering endless questions eliminated other potential causes of my symptoms, which resulted in the official diagnosis, by elimination, of Long-COVID or Post-COVID Viral Fatigue.
There seems to be some "confusion" in the world about what Long-COVID is; most questions about my symptoms focus on my breathing. Could it be lung damage or a worsening of my asthma? Well, no, not for me - my respiratory health has never been better, mainly due to taking extreme care over the last two years to monitor it.
Treatment
There are no medications available to me to treat this condition; what I have is strikingly similar to Chronic Fatigue Syndrom (CFS) or Myalgic Encephalomyelitis (ME), and the treatments are limited to rest and graded exercise.
This state of affairs wasn't enough for me; I was getting worse and couldn't afford to stop everything and rest for potentially months. However, my CEO has been very supportive and put me in contact with a Perrin Technique practitioner - and thus, I was introduced to a potential avenue to getting better.
I won't go into tremendous detail, but it appears that Long-COVID, Post-Viral Fatigue Syndrome, Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, Myalgic encephalomyelitis, and Fybromialgia may be conditions with a common root cause - namely dysfunction in the neuro-lymphatic drainage.
The Perrin Technique is essentially a body massage to promote correct flow. I don't pretend to understand the science fully; there is plenty of reading out there explaining the science and practicalities of the conditions.
Cure and Prognosis
Here is the hard part, for me anyway. There isn't a cure; there are things that can help - but I may need to live with this for the rest of my life. There is a good chance that I will be able to recover to the point of leading an everyday life. However, there is always a risk of relapsing into this state of fatigue.
I'm fortunate that my colleagues, leadership team, organisations I volunteer with, family and friends have all been very supportive. I am very limited in how much time I can spend on mental or physical activities. A couple of hours of light computer use is enough to exhaust me, similar to physical exercise, although half an hour of walking is as much I can cope with, and even that requires three days to recover.
I've found a baseline; through rest and meditation, I have found a way to balance my physical and mental health. I am losing weight and going to see the Osteopath for treatments weekly. I can't manage much more than the basic things I need to do to live: cook, clean and eat.
Any energy I do have leftover I try to apply to writing, as I can use Otter.ai to dictate and transcribe my words and then later edit them on the computer using Grammarly. I would love to get back to work, content creation and study - however, at the moment, that isn't possible.
Summary
I'm going to keep fighting, and I am a typical Type A personality, so I will try and push through; I am learning, though that isn't the way forwards with this condition. I'll check in here again with an update in a few months, hopefully with some good news.