Do you fit this paradigm?

Posted by Bsquared @barbarabell, Feb 28 12:18pm

I caught COVID on Halloween 2020 and became very sick for about 3 weeks. I was very healthy and fit; I participated in many sports/outdoor activities and traveled quite a bit. After ‘recovery’, I felt better for a bit but never really great. I tried to scuba dive, hike, travel, etc but I just wasn’t enjoying it much. Never felt very good, cried over nothing all the time and had horrible panic attacks. About a year later, I started to get really sick: rashes, allergies to everything, shortness of breath, internal tremors, brain fog, facial tics, nerve pain, muscle pain, everything smells like burning algae, exercise is a joke. Constant crying, depression, nihilism, fear…you know the drill. Fatigue that cannot be adequately described.

So, I’m just wondering who else fits this paradigm? Infection with ‘classic’ COVID before the vaccine and then never really got completely better for a time? Then, started a slow, steady decline that stole away everything in life that gave you joy? Anybody see improvement or find anything that helps? By the way, I do have a freaking army of doctors and I’m a patient at UNC Covid so I’m not lacking in medical attention.

Thanks for taking the time to read this.

Interested in more discussions like this? Go to the Post-COVID Recovery & COVID-19 Support Group.

@meljocox

I was in my best shape and best life before getting Covid Dec 2020. Never had a vaccine before or since.

I did have psoriatic arthritis and had JUST gotten relief from my 10+ yrs of arthritis pain after starting Humira.
Gods funny humor showed me to be careful with my words because before Covid I had exclaimed how amazing it felt to NOT live in pain and how I NEVER want to live like that again……
I was pretty sick for about 3 weeks with a different symptom every day. Never bad enough to be in a hospital but I was quarantined with my young son and did ok… just sick and tired and struggling to pull myself up each day to not let him be afraid.
It took me 3 months to “feel normal again”. I had lifted weights for 30yrs at this point, even did what you would consider powerlifting but never competed. I was healthy, lean, strong, and full of happiness and energy…. Until then. Once I recovered it was like I didn’t skip a beat in the gym. I had all my normal workouts back on track and felt amazing.
Three months later I started getting a wide array of weird symptoms from heart palpitations, fatigue, insomnia, anxiety, extreme muscle pain and a continuous decline in muscle strength and endurance. Week after week the pain was more severe the weakness more pronounced. My GI symptoms that I always had were exacerbated and over the last 3 years have progressed beyond compare. A daily eye twitch for probably 6 months, almost daily cramps in my legs, tiny spasms under my skin down my legs, and fingers cramping.
Numbness in extremities, horrible brain fog and what was almost like memory loss? It was like I was busy all day but accomplished nothing and couldn’t explain how… like walking in circles trying to get things done. Like maybe In slow motion?!

I saw every kind of specialist for next 6 mos trying to get answers. Gastroenterologist, neurologist, cardiologist, psychologist, psychiatrist, endocrinologist..,. Finally after the psychologist referred me to psychiatrist and I was diagnosed with ADHD, the cardiologist diagnosed me with two types of heart palpitations that he couldn’t help with, the endocrinologist diagnosed me with Long Covid, but said they’re isn’t much we know or can do and we don’t know if it will come and go or come and stay…. I was on a path of discovery and recovery…
3 years later the neurologist said he can’t help me, my original rheumatologist diagnosed me recently with fibromyalgia, and my gi dr after 3 years of tests, scans and 4 different medications finally prescribed me something to help with my pain and symptoms.
I use to take allergy meds before taking humira for arthritis in 2020… now I take a handful of med for all the ailments. For nerve pain, for insomnia, for brain fog/adhd, for stomach, for a viral infection that apparently Covid brought out of hiding, muscle cramps, and I’m sure other stuff.
Someone above mentioned PEM (post exertional malaise) that is associated with CFS but now also Long Covid.
I’ve been doing research with some holistic medicine drs and some wellness drs who think it’s some mitochondrial function problem. Whether Covid triggered it or it’s secondary to whatever else we are trying to find a way to test for it and do some treatments based on that.
I’ve not ever been much of a crier or had depression in my lifetime… but these last 3 years have ran me into the ground. Depression from not knowing what was wrong with me depression from no one being willing to help me even if just to treat my symptoms (finally my rheumatologist seems to be the only one willing to help). Depression from accepting this new way of life as my new normal and not being able to do anything physically for 3yrs. Accepting this new body that hurts now almost every day. Sleeping days away at times when before I couldn’t understand how people even took a mid day nap?! What is that? Now I know all too well.
I feel like if I accept this body then I accept the decline of it even faster. I always lived my life to know that because I was so healthy “I could get through anything being one step ahead and defying old age”…. Now my parents who are 25yrs older than me are probably healthier than I am and they are in their 70’s. To their defense they work out every day too. That’s where I got it from.
I am starting cryogenic chamber sessions tomorrow, I am going to try to add testosterone (being a woman in my late 40’s this will be the tiniest amount) and peptides into my regimen in the next week or two and my sweet husband has been doing deep tissue messages about 2-3 days a week for a couple weeks now…. With the goals of treating my body in every way possible from a cellular level to heal and build from the inside…. I can’t let the lack of information limit me from trying to survive and recover… I will desperately seek anything in any form to find a way to live life again..

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We are very similar in our journey. Like you, I’m still exploring and not giving up. The difference is that I am your parent’s age! Would love to compare notes.

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Bet you aren’t my parents’ age! I turn 65 next month!

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@mizbbd

I tested positive for Covid, Jan 2022, almost exactly one year after my 2nd dose of Pfizer vax. I feel the vaccine has weakened my immunity. My dearest friends of 30 plus years, are now saying, “hey, if it’s out there, Bobbi is gonna get it”
I had heard of LC and joked with my friends about me having it. Well, I know what I experience IS NOT a joke.
I’m afraid to even mention it to a Dr.
I recently moved to PNW, while sick with COVID, and I’ve finally made a “new patient” appointment, this morning, with a clinic that is accepting new patients.
Thank you so much for these discussions. I feel crazy! Am I making this up? Are the lesions and cysts and inflammation normal to have? Why am I so damn exhausted? I couldn’t even cook dinner this evening.
Again, thank you so much

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I have many of the long Covid symptoms after I recieved the Pfizer vaccine in Oct.2023. It is so hard.I have better days and I think oh good and then I go down hill again. So frustrating and no one seems to have answers. Just keep on one day at a time and hope it gets better

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@abbydoo

I have many of the long Covid symptoms after I recieved the Pfizer vaccine in Oct.2023. It is so hard.I have better days and I think oh good and then I go down hill again. So frustrating and no one seems to have answers. Just keep on one day at a time and hope it gets better

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See research on post vaccine symptoms. In 2023 the door came open. Toxin impacts of spike protein are the primary, but a host of other direct and indirect issues.

Seach: post covid vaccine symptoms 2023 2024

See table, open in link, in the journal publication below:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9959958/

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Really sorry to hear your situation. The common thing I can share is that like I was very physically active. Got a mild case of covid and then long covid. I could still do some of my activities (backpacking) but I felt really crummy so it took a lot of the fun out of it. But then 10 months out from my initial infection my health collapsed and I got to the point where I could not walk around the block and could not use a computer. Good part of story is I got into a LC clinic at Stanford and they gave me Naltrexone and Abilify which have greatly improved my symptoms. Not like before but I can use a computer fine and even an easy short backpack.

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@cropdoc

See research on post vaccine symptoms. In 2023 the door came open. Toxin impacts of spike protein are the primary, but a host of other direct and indirect issues.

Seach: post covid vaccine symptoms 2023 2024

See table, open in link, in the journal publication below:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9959958/

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Thank you for the information.I have many of the symptoms following my shot. Very hard to handle all this not knowing if you are going to get better.

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@abbydoo

Thank you for the information.I have many of the symptoms following my shot. Very hard to handle all this not knowing if you are going to get better.

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Yes, that is it, isn’t it? The unknown. Will I ever get well enough to live a normal life again?

People who really don’t understand always tell me to be “positive”. I have always been a positive sort of person, but continued worsening symptoms and an unknown future, makes it very hard to “put on a happy face”.

I do that as much as I can, mostly for my grandchildren. Invariably, after such a display I hear “Oh, I’m glad you are so much better!”
No, just faking it as much as I can for the comfort of others.

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@dloos

Yes, we have lost ourselves. That is so true.

I keep wondering if I am coming back, and fear that I am not. My issues are progressive. After two years I am not recovering. I am losing more vision, more hearing and more balance daily.

I am in treatment, but nothing helps.

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I can relate, since covid I keep declining. But before covid and exactly 2 weeks after 2nd vaccine I had 2 small strokes. Then 3 months later I got covid. I has been hell ever since. I was in decent health for 76, now 79.

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@dloos

Yes, that is it, isn’t it? The unknown. Will I ever get well enough to live a normal life again?

People who really don’t understand always tell me to be “positive”. I have always been a positive sort of person, but continued worsening symptoms and an unknown future, makes it very hard to “put on a happy face”.

I do that as much as I can, mostly for my grandchildren. Invariably, after such a display I hear “Oh, I’m glad you are so much better!”
No, just faking it as much as I can for the comfort of others.

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Some of my family will say are you still dealing with that I know they can’t relate.
I’ve had lupus for many years and always heard you don’t look sick . Really many timesI was using every ounce of energy I had. The worse part of this vaccine reaction is the fear it wont go away

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@dloos

Yes, that is it, isn’t it? The unknown. Will I ever get well enough to live a normal life again?

People who really don’t understand always tell me to be “positive”. I have always been a positive sort of person, but continued worsening symptoms and an unknown future, makes it very hard to “put on a happy face”.

I do that as much as I can, mostly for my grandchildren. Invariably, after such a display I hear “Oh, I’m glad you are so much better!”
No, just faking it as much as I can for the comfort of others.

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Know exactly what you are saying and going through. People don’t ask anymore. They think it just disappeared. They are so wrong

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