To ask if you think yourself or your family had covid before it was a thing.

[Starry4120]

I’ve heard so many reports that people were very ill before covid was seen as a major issue here in the U.K.

Obviously there is no way to know. Even with an antibody test you may not have long lasting antibodies and we don’t know how long we are in immune. So it really doesn’t make a difference if we have or not. We still need to act like we haven’t of course.

Back last January, nearly a year ago. Both dc were extremely poorly suddenly. Both had high fevers. As a parent I’ve never seen them as ill, both were very fatigued. It started with Dd, then a few days later DS. They did not have a cough whilst they had a fever but they had a cough shortly after the fever subsided. Dd coughed non stop for a week, she just couldn’t stop and it would make her vomit it was that bad. Doctors had no answer. Even said it could have been scarlet fever with the rash 🤷‍♀️

Many children in DD’s class had similar. Many of the teachers did too. I remember a teacher saying many of them had been off with a bad cough/chest they couldn’t shift fully for weeks.

A child in DS’s class travelled to China for a holiday (if I can remember rightly) not long before Christmas, came back and went off ill herself shortly after. Makes you wonder. Of course it could be a complete coincidence!

The only thing that makes me think they did
Not have covid is that both myself and partner did not get ill despite having a lot of close contact with dc (as all parents do). Saying that I was very poorly Christmas 2019!

It really makes no difference but wondering what others views are on this matter?

We had something nasty doing the runs at work on late Feb, early Mar. Only one person fit the symptoms to isolate. Which went on the full 14 days (at that time you had to evaluate your symptoms after 7 days, if none, you were ok to go out and about). Nobody had a test at that time.
I possibly passed it to my husband, who was a bit ill too.
My daughter had no symptoms.
I would say exhaustion was the main problem with that virus. And a feeling of doom.
My coffee tested weird (I could not drink it) for two days in the morning. Only two days. And only the morning coffee.
Taste and smell changes were no symptoms yet.

Me. I was really ill end of January/start or Feb.
Started with a cough that wouldn’t go and got progressively worse, until I was vomiting from coughing so much. Especially at night, so I didn’t sleep and started to feel horrible during the day but I was convinced that this was because I wasn’t sleeping. Still went into work because you don’t call in sick for a cough (I’m a TA - interestingly no one else had symptoms, neither staff nor children). One evening at the end of the week I was waiting for my own kids to finish an after school activity and suddenly felt so awful I lay down in the book corner in my classroom and then couldn’t stand up. One of the other staff members drove me and the kids home because I wasn’t safe to drive, and I had a massive temperature that weekend. By Monday I felt loads better so went back into school but the cough didn’t shift so I saw a GP who said it was pneumonia. They tested me for that, it came back negative - the conclusion was I had a virus which I just had to get rid of on my own.
A few days later I lost all sense of taste and smell. Completely. Couldn’t detect a thing, not even salty vs sweet. That lasted for about a week.

I had it without doubt but no one I knew seemed to pick it up from me. Not DH, not my kids, not anyone at school - god knows how many people I infected who were asymptomatic though!

Dec 2019 my daughter, me & DH came down with a virus which if I had it now would definitely think it was Covid. Really high temperature, severe fatigue and then horrendous cough. My DH had it the worst, he was in bed unable to move for over a week, I’ve never seen him so ill and he never normally gets temperatures. Loads in my DDs school were off with the same thing at the time. Weirdly even though she’s at a huge secondary school there have only been a handful of cases since since they went back in September with hardly any of them having to self isolate so it makes you wonder if a lot of them had it before. It could just be coincidence though.

My son and I had flu, an awful cough and both ended up in hospital with pneumonia in December 2019. It took 3 different courses of antibiotics to sort me out and 2 sets for my son (he was 17 months) and I’m immuno suppressed. I’m convinced it was covid as I’d had my flu jab and had never caught it before.

I suspect I may have had it.

In Feb 2020(I think) I was in an off licence, buying essentials (red wine) and chatting to someone who had just returned from a part of Scotland where the first cases had been.

A week or so later I was generally meh but had a high temp, 40 on my ear thermometer.

Normally if I get a temp I feel really unwell and my normal temp is quite low, 37 means I normally feel ill.

End of Nov to December. With blood tests to figure out what was going on with my chest. No taste or smell either.
Came down with it a few days after going to warner bros studio tour.

Yep.

There was a terrible coughing/fluey bug that went through my workplace in Dec 2019. I've honestly never seen anything like it. It took down whole teams at a time. I came down with it and was off work for two whole weeks completely bedbound. I was coughing, it hurt to breathe, I was dizzy, exhausted, I had a temperature and diarrhea.

At least 2 people in my workplace had coughs that didn't go for months. It was scary!

My one year old caught it from me and just didn't seem to make a full recovery. We were back and fore G.P's / OOO for 2 months as she kept suffering breathing difficulties and had crackles on her left lung but had no signs of bacterial infection.

Finally, during a particularly bad bout, she was hospitalised at the end of feb and treated for Kawasaki disease. She hasn"t had any breathing issues since.

I'm convinced it was Covid.

We think so yes. We went to an event which was jam packed end of November- a light festival. Dd1 (10 at the time) started feeling unwell whilst we were there. She had a week off school with the only symptom being a high temp. Dd1 is never ill and has never had time off school more than a day in the past. At one point I needed help carrying her up the stairs she was so weak.

Dp and I went to Tenerife between Boxing Day and new year 2019. Dp started showing symptoms on the trip and ended up off sick 1st 2 weeks of term. Never seen him so grey and unwell - just a cough and a temp. I did get it but only mildly.

Dh last December. He went to a meeting with numerous people from / who had travelled through China.
He then had a headache, chills, fever but no cold symptoms. Assumed flu really at the time. He coughed for about 6 weeks and was so breathless that he couldn’t walk to the end of the road for about a month. But the thing that delays it for me is that at the time he complained all drinks tasted funny. Especially Coke. He said it tasted like soap. That’s lasted about two months. He kept rinsing the glasses becusse he thought they were still soapy.

sways

I wish someone would do some research on these cases.

Given that their are variations in viruses it is possible that it was a slightly different strain.

Thanks all. It really makes no difference but very interesting to know. I read an article from Italy that covid was found in blood samples from as early as September 2019!

They were very poorly. They went back to school for a week after Christmas and got ill. It happened so quickly too.

I sent Dd to school in the morning her completely usual happy self. I picked her up normal time and she just didn’t seem right and very tired and bothered. By that night her temperature got to over 40. Thankfully Calpol and ibuprofen brought it down nicely but would increase again between doses. DS was similar. Had no answer for it at the time. There only symptoms were a fever and extreme fatigue but a cough once the fever had gone. Very odd.

I guess we will never know!

DH and I are quite sure we had it just before the first lockdown in March. DH is still suffering with Long Covid and I was since diagnosed with an autoimmune disease that I believe was triggered by Covid.

My friend is absolutely convinced her father died of it in December 2019, before it was supposed to be here at all. The pattern his short illness took does sound incredibly like it .

We were all ill with "flu" nasty coughs at work at the end of 2019. Could have just been seasonal stuff, but I never normally get anything like that.

I didn't see your thread when it started but pretty much everyone on here had covid before it was generally acknowledged

If you go back to the early days of this topic I remember loads of posters were sure that they and all their family and it pre Jan 20 albeit a strain that didn't spread widely and wasn't picked up by any kind of medical radar.

It would make an interesting study to look in detail at the MN membership to find out if they truly were early sufferers and why this wasn't picked up at the time.

Testing in Feb/March 20 was very much focussed on those with symptoms and previous travel or contact with known case.

The vast majority of those tested were negative, so something else was in circulation as well, causing those symptoms

My poor brother had a very heavy cold that lasted ages throughout xmas and the new year .he works in an office where lots of international travel is required. He innocently said it had been going round since his colleague brought it back from china in October! I was already thinking of the movie Contagion even then lol
He had SARS in the past and he said he didnt feel as bad as that.

Flew back from Spain after the Feb half term. Had a cough that just went on and on for weeks- every time I took an in breath I coughed. Weird neck and back pain. Series of optical migraines (very weird!) . Night sweats. Fatigue that went on for months, breathlessness as well. Worst day of the cough I remember walking home from work and when I breathed in it felt like my lungs were burning!
DS was ill for two days with a high fever. DH had a mild cough and fatigue. DD nothing .
I guess we’ll never know!

I'm sure I had it in October 2019 I was very poorly and in hospital the doctors couldn't work out what was wrong with me. My oxygen levels were so low and I had a terrible cough. It took 3 months to stop being breathless and a year to recover fully. I caught it off my husband who works in a gym that has lots of Chinese students who would of recently returned from China, thats my theory

Yes. Absolutely sure I had it December 2019 while working at the London hospital that exploded with it a few months after.

I was diagnosed with pneumonia but anti biotics did nothing. I had a pain in my chest so bad I couldn't move and breathing was like being stabbed and I couldn't speak more than one word at a time. They diagnosed pluerisy but didn't X-ray as I was 5 weeks pregnant with a history of miscarriages.

The cough was horrific. I couldn't stop it. It was violent and made me throw up.

It lasted for 8 weeks, then in a lesser form for 3 months.

I was 39 and healthy, never been so ill my life. Dh would shake me awake at night as he was terrified I would die in my sleep my breathing was so erratic.

My oxygen was 92 when I went to A&E the day the day the chest pains kicked in. All they could do was guess and send me off with antibiotics.

My Dh had the cough and it lasted two months. Kids were ok - my Dd had a few days off school with a temp but teen was fine.

Nov/Dec 2019 eldest sent home from secondary school blazing temperature, she came home got into bed and didn’t surface other than toilet, I kept her topped with fluids and meds, youngest sent home from primary 2 days later same thing, I got ill about a week later (also work in primary, support role and after school care) I was so tired, then the cough started and I was sweating like a water fall down my back sweating, I was drinking bottle after bottle of water to try and stop the cough, was swigging cough bottles, throat sweets the lot and nothing was getting rid of it. I have never felt so ill. I took one of my DDs spare inhalers and was using that trying to open my airways. About a week in bed I started to feel human again. But I’m still extremely tired all the time, I struggle when I run now get breathless quickly and muscles aches all the time. Didn’t think or know anything, covid wasn’t a thing and when you work with kids and have kids you are bound to pick up bugs etc so generally just get on with it. If the pandemic had been in full swing the symptoms I had I would of said 100% covid never in my life have I been so sick

Definitely think we had Covid in Nov 2019 after DH returned from an overseas work trip. Whole family had brief fever, mild but persistent diarrhoea and scratchy sore throat. DC better in days (no cough), DH & I had hacking dry cough so bad we had to sit up at night for a week - it lingered for weeks. All GP blood tests came back negative for known bacteria & viruses and I had recently had a flu jab so not that. I was unwell for 8 weeks with high blood inflammation and rashes. We are not assuming we are immune this time round but glad that we recovered ok if it was Covid.

Yes I think I had in March 2020, but it was just before things really kicked off. I coughed for months and months after. I've just had confirmed covid (positive PCR) and it felt very very similar.