So, my husband has been going a bit stir crazy and it's been hard for him to stay in the house. He went to the liquor store a few times in the past few weeks, a grocery store, Dollar General store, the dentist (who has a pretty open office with low partitions in between patients), and then this past Sunday he went to the Italian American Club to make wine with his cousins. I have been nagging at him a little about all of this, and he told me not to worry, he wears a mask, etc. Of course at the dentist he couldn't do that while his mouth was open in the chair and there were other patients there at the same time. Before he went to the club I asked him how are they going to taste wine with masks on, and he assured me that it was just going to be him and 2 other cousins who are fully vaxxed and boosted. Well he got there and there were 9 of the cousins there, people made food and they were eating and drinking, hanging out together, and of course the masks came off for that. And one of his cousins had covid over the holidays and was there, unmasked, and her sister and sister's husband both have covid now. They hadn't been anywhere, the only exposure was the cousin who had it. Turns out this cousin didn't test again after she tested positive and just waited a week before going about her normal business because she didn't have any symptoms anymore.
So yesterday I started feeling feverish and had aches and pains. I have bad allergies so my respiratory system was about the same as always, but I was dizzy and achy. When I go to the doctor, normally my temp is 97.1F, which is lower than most people, but my O2 is normally 98. Well yesterday hubby kept monitoring my temp and it steadily climbed in just a few hours until it reached 99.8F, and my O2 was at 93 and then at one point down to 89. I had the heat turned up and had blankets on me but I was still cold. Hubby didn't really have much in the way of any symptoms, I had noticed he had been sneezing some and clearing his throat over the past few days but he also has allergies so didn't think much of it. My fever broke around midnight (nothing in my lungs).
I did one of those home test kits today and I tested positive. There are two lines on the test strip, one is the control line (blue) and the other is the "positive" reading (pink). The pink line was faint, but the instruction manual said that if there was a pink line, even if faint, that was a positive read. I am feeling much better, my temp is at 98F and my O2 is at 95. I am still a little dizzy and tired but overall I am not too bad. Hubby went to pick up my curbside grocery order and when he gets back he will do a test as well.
I have to say I am a little irritated right now. I have been trying so hard to keep us safe and I have turned down work in order to do so and missing out on spending time with family, now this. At least we were both fully vaxxed and boosted, otherwise the outcome could have been much worse.
Sorry to hear this. It's frustrating to say the least.
We're still waiting for the results of our PCR tests. Rapid antigen tests (or RAT Tests as they are known in Australia) are exceptionally difficult to come by at the moment so we're relying on the state PCR tests but they are overwhelmed but the numbers of requests so results are slow to come in. We've been told up to 72hrs before we get the results. Earlier in the month and end of last year, it's been taking 6 days or more... (this is mostly due to state border restrictions mandating testing in the 48hrs before crossing a state border and at day 6 (varies depending on state).
So we sit and wait. I know either way that I have a chest infection on top of everything else so started antibiotics on Tuesday. I'm responding to them in relation to the crap I'm coughing up but the evenings are still worse and I'm coughing up clear liquid as well as green phlegm (I usually cough up phlegm so this isn't unusual but the taste changed on Tuesday and that is my indicator of an infection). I ache as well (that started on Sunday but I'd put that down to my bad back) but it's the thoracic region that aches, as well as the lumbar region. Headache and sore throat are still present as obviously is the cough. No temperature yet though (It's higher than normal for me but still only 36.9°C). Hopefully if it is covid it won't be bad given how I feel now. We too had been so very careful regarding exposure with complete minimising of social contact, only going out to outdoor settings and walking in the bush.
As for the O2 readings. Don't worry too much about them. My normal is 94% often falling to 89% at night. Apparently for people like myself (severe asthmatic, as in 6 medications to control it) this is the new normal and nothing to worry about, but in hospital they'll put me back on oxygen when it drops below 90% (so anything starting with an 8x%). I've been told by my respiratory consultant and the nursing staff that they see a considerable number of patients (not related to covid) with figures like this and now if it is 90% or above, don't worry about it.
My hubby turned around this morning and asked be if I wanted our morning walk! He seems oblivious to the fact that we're not meant to leave the 'backyard'. Even going to the letterbox is pushing that definition but doing the usual morning walk is definitely out... keeping separate is pushing life in our home with 1 bathroom & 1 bedroom.
I've had to read the self isolation rules to him. He's not impressed lol! But if he does have it, he's asymptomatic.
Only problem is reinfection rates. I know two people who have gotten it twice over the past year. The flu doesn't usually do that.
Yep, very true and I suspect that it is quite possible to be reinfected with a different strain/variant as well. We know quite a few of our family who work in child care of some form (social worker in children's home, special needs care assistant in school, teacher & separately head teacher in primary schools) who have all had covid more than once. My step-brother has had in 3 times now and is fiancee twice. They work in the same children's home. Both are fully vaccinated, in fact they all are but it hasn't stopped them catching it.
Here I'm fully vaccinated with a booster on the 1st December. Hubby who is asymptomatic is only fully vaccinated with last vaccine 22nd September. His booster is booked for 27th January.
We'll just have to wait and see with respect to the results, but I seem to have a lot of the symptoms this time around (It's my 3rd chest infection in 6 months but this is different to the other 2).
Given that double pneumonia nearly killed me 4½ years ago and I was fully vaccinated then as well with 2 separate pneumonia jabs 10 years apart and the last had only been less than 12 months before I went down with it, I'm seriously hoping I don't deteriorate rapidly.
With the pneumonia, we were exposed on the Saturday. Sunday we were fine, in fact I dropped hubby at the airport an hour away. Monday I felt unwell and actually asked him to come home. Something I've only done once before. He felt unwell as well, so changed his return ticket and flew home on the Tuesday. He had to get a taxi home because I didn't feel well enough to drive. Wednesday he booked a doctor's appointment by which time we were both too ill to realise that the appointment on Thursday was 'too late'. Thursday's doctor's appointment saw me taken by ambulance directly from the surgery. I lost consciousness almost immediately. Pulse ox was in the 30's because my body was already shutting down. I was taken to the local regional hospital (this is now what I've been told happened) and immediately put into a ventilator and
airlifted to the capital city hospital (across a state/territory border). I actually don't know when exactly I regained consciousness but I spent 12 days in ICU, 6 of them on a respirator so we'll be keeping a very close eye on my symptoms, I can tell you. I spent another 2 months in hospital before I was safe enough to be allowed home. Since then I've received another 2 pneumonia vaccinations. One in the months after double pneumonia and then again in 2020 when the doctors rang us to call both of us back in because the new pneumonia vaccine covered an additional 6 strains which they felt given our history was important enough to warrant revaccination. Hubby also went down with pneumonia and the only thing that kept him out of hospital was agreeing to see our doctor on a daily basis. She wanted him in hospital but appreciated that we have live stock that needs looking after and knew that there was no one else who could do this for us.
So me coughing up fluid as well as phlegm isn't good news. Here it's more a case of 'what have I got?' rather than 'have I...'.
