Help! I have covid.

[TryingNotToPanicOverCovid]

Ive just found out Ive got covid this evening. I have absolutely no idea how. I have been walking everyday, but not going in shops or anywhere indoors. Ive been posting on these threads for a while as Im clinically vulnerable and have pulled kids out of school (this Jan/last march) and have been geberalky really anxious. We hose to shield for 2 months last March, washed goods etc.

I'm really anxious now. Are there things I can do to lesson chance of getting really ill?

I only felt like I needed my blue inhaler for first time in ages and wouldn't have thought anything of it other than my anxiety meant I was worried that if my asthma got worse they'd want to know if Id got covid so I tested to show I didn't.

Are there any false positives?

I don't want to die in the next 2 weeks. Or go to hospital.

I've liked reading the data threads and been watching the time til my predicted vaccine (group 6) get closer as both have helped anxiety. But I can't now believe I have it. I didn't think it was possible.

How bad will I get? Is there anything that can help reduce the likelihood of death/hospital.

Ive left an e consult for the dr (although I don't think they want to be consulted about covid?! Or maybe they mean get a test.)

Im so frightened.

(Namechanged as I'm probably obvious to anyone I know - say hi! )

Id really like to know if I have a false positive. I am so anxious.

My asthma is slightly worse and I coughed in the evening which I assumed was asthma. So I guess could be symptoms. I dont feel ill. I feel exhausted from not sleeping. Dr xand didn't feel too bad to begin with did he 😬.

We've walked everyday . I have walked with a family member I dont live with twice in the last week. Outside and spaced as Ive been so anxious (and so aware how close to my vaccine I was.) They live on their own so I am worried about them. I haven't told them yet but will need to this morning.

My husband has asthma and had a very mild dose of Covid - it didn't go to his chest at all. It's not a given that because you have asthma, you WILL get a bad dose of Covid. A lot depends on the viral load you received (and if you've been shielding carefully then this is likely to be low.) Plus vitamin D does help so if you've already been taking that for some time then your immune system will be in good shape.

1. you need to find ways to manage your anxiety so you don't communicate it to your kids. Whatever works for you, mindfulness, hot baths, chatting to a friend on the phone. But find a way of managing this otherwise you will terrify them.

2. How old are your kids? Can then feed themselves? If so, make sure there is lots of food in the house that they can prepare for themselves if you felt too poorly to get out of bed (and I'm not saying you will. Even in the worst bits of our COVID we were still able to go into the kitchen and make a sandwich for DS. But just in case.) Think cereal, toast, micro meals, yogurts, fruit etc.

3. make sure you have paracetamol to hand but try and avoid ibruprofen - the jury is still out on whether that can make symptoms worse.

4. If you have Netflicks or Amazon etc, download a bunch of films for the kids to watch when they are bored.

5. Let the school know, so they have realistic expectations re: homeschooling. Also, depending on the date of your test result - is it 14 days from when the kids went into school at the start of term? If not, you need to let them know.

6. Complete track and trace for every member of your household.

7. Do you have a DH or DP? If you did have to go to hospital - plan for who will look after your kids - again, this is worst case scenario, so don't let what is a very slim scenario completely freak you out.

8. Relax expectations on the kids - if they want to veg out in Jim-jams watching CBeebies then let them. If they want to spend the entire day playing Lego, let them. My DS stayed in a onesie for 10 days during our isolation period. We just washed it every couple of days.

9. If you can afford it - Chuck some treats in the food shop.

10. ventilate the house so the viral load spread to other members of the household is as low as possible. Wash hands. Clean surfaces, door handles etc.

But don't panic. For most of us it is a mild illness akin to a normal winter bug. You need to try and manage the anxiety because your children will pick up on it.

Morning! Wondering if anyone knows how long on oxygen for there to be a improvement its been 5 days since my friend has been in hospital and is not feeling any better. Thanks.

Please try not to be so anxious. I am also prone to catastrophizing about my health (though not to do with viruses, it seems) so I know how it goes, and there's been a lot of effort by the government to frighten people into doing the right thing. But you really really are almost certainly going to be feeling fine in two weeks time.

Even though you're in a high risk category, your risk of dying from Covid is really very small. For a man of 60 it's 0.13% now. Even if you have a high BMI, you're young. Most of the people who become seriously ill with Covid and die are more than twice your age. That's a lot!!

If you had a dodgy mole and your GP said there was a 1 in 100 chance it was a melanoma, with then, even if it were, a still 90% survival rate, how worried would you be? If your BMI is very high, then your risk of dying of pregnancy-related complications would have been quite high. (My risk of dying in my second pregnancy, I found out after the event, was 1/200, because of age, a clotting disorder, and a massive hemorrhage in the first one. I didn't even know that. If I had, it wouldn't have stopped me having a second child.)

So it is really NOT the moment to be thinking about what to leave for your daughters! Especially as you don't even feel very ill. All the people I know who've been fairly ill with Covid (about 60, ages 5-99, all fine now, one in hospital for two days) were taken ill quickly: the people who started mild stayed mild. Please trust your body and try not to panic your children. My father had a heart attack when I was 6, and it was awful. I think that's what started my health anxiety in the first place. Sleep! Rest! Warm fluids!

I'm overweight and DH has asthma. We were poorly with covid but not hospitalised. I took vitamin D, ibuprofen (muscles and joints all ached), sambucol and manuka honey. A bit random I know. I also sometimes walked a few loops of garden with covid..... It was horrible but we got better. Try not to panic.

OP, I know it’s scary but please not to think about planning for your death. The odds are in your favour.

I have had covid. I am in the extremely clinically vulnerable group. I have Crohn’s disease and at the time of my covid my Crohns was very severe. I was injecting an immonsuppressant, taking high dose steroids and an oral form of mild chemotherapy. I was fine. I felt terrible, my cough was awful and it eventually turned into pneumonia but I didn’t need to be in hospital. I just rested a lot, drank lots of water and took painkillers.

Honestly, it’s very likely you will be absolutely fine, and like a previous poster said, you can get a positive result long after the illness has passed. You may well have had it asymptotically a few weeks ago.

Please try and think positive and in the nicest possible and kindest way, try not to put any of your anxiety or worries onto your children

Good luck!
It sounds mild so far so fingers crossed it stays mild

You will be fine and will probably realise in a few days that you didn't need to be so frightened and didn't need to have taken your kids out of school.

I know a few ECV people who have had it and they had it v mildly.

You are more likely to be ok than not - statistically x

I think that a PP brought up an excellent point about the possibility of Covid Positivity showing up for 90 days post infection.

I’m a nurse working in a nursing home. One of our patients needed a hospital stay and the hospital lied to us and discharged him
back with Covid (we proved Covid negative before he went in for his op, they said he tested negative again before discharge but actually he tested positive and they concealed the information). Anyway, his symptoms were extremely mild, no cough etc and none of the other residents or staff caught it as we isolated him in a separate unit and barrier nursed him there.

After that none of our patients were able to go out and visitors weren’t allowed. Almost 3
months later he tested positive again (85th day after the positive at the hospital). He’d only been on a few brief walks around the block with a member of staff who observed he was distancing and not touching anything outside of stopping to chat with strangers etc. Yet again, all the other residents and staff tested negative. We had to seek advice from Public Health England and they reassured us that they were almost 99% that this was remnants picked up from his infection months before. He had no symptoms and didn’t pass it on to anyone.

I think there’s a chance, given that you don’t actually seem to be showing any symptoms other than usual asthma symptoms,
and haven’t been anywhere that you could have had Covid without symptoms when your kids were in school up to 90 days ago
and this is “old” virus that’s been picked up in screening.

You’d still need to follow all the advice re isolation of course.

All that said, with the new variant, I’ve not been meeting anyone outside and if I do have to walk I wear a mask and completely avoid other people, going at unusual times to deserted places. Are your kids of the age that they’d be touching play equipment? Stroking dogs? Did you sanitise your hands after touching the takeaway coffee cup?

@TryingNotToPanicOverCovid I rang 111 and they insisted on calling ambulance to check me over and I said no need and they said computer says yes. They wanted them to do an ECG at home due to heart rate. Two hours later London ambulance service calls me and says just to let you know ambulance will be about eight hours. I said no really no need for one and they said why did you call one. I said I didn’t, 111 did. So they listened to symptoms and said yes you do need to be checked but we are too busy to do check anyway so we would just take you to a&e can you get self there. I said sure it’s couple of miles away, I will drive. So I did that. 111 felt totally I joined up in terms of knowing what ambulance service could and couldn’t do. A&e said it was right I went though and also that no way of knowing so good to do all the tests to get a baseline in case I deteriorated. They did bloods, X-ray (which showed the glass crystals effect of mild-moderate covid) and ECG. I feel v lucky to have improved so quickly with antibiotics. They also gave me prednisone so keep at home and take if wheezing started but it didn’t thankfully.

How are you feeling op? X

Sounds probable you got a low viral load.
Open windows, keep taking vitamin d, don’t hold back on using your inhaler. Eat plenty. Drink fluids. Sleep on your front. Take antihistamines if you have them. Rest. Monitor sats. Only take paracetamol if your temperature is over 38 (below that it helps kill the virus). Eat dried fruit and green veg.
My ECV husband recovered without hospital despite sats being consistently in the low 80s, dropping to 77 on occasion.

Oh, and if it improves then worsens ask them to consider secondary pneumonia.
Sure you’ll be fine though.

Hope you're ok op

Just to reassure you. I work at a care home and 50 out of the 55 staff tested positive over Christmas and early January. We all had varying symptoms and we are a mixed bag reguarding general health,lifestyle etc . A few staff very unhealthy...now end of January we are all fine and some are still a bit breathless and a lot of us feel generally knackered but no one required hospital treatment. Unfortunately our residents have not done so well but at least a third of the 80/90 year olds are now ok 🙂
The biggest problem for many of us was the anxiety of having Covid and not the actual symptoms. I hope you are feeling better now .💐

Thanks so much for all the reassurance and posts. I'm now a week since I tested. I have a cough that's worse. I am very fatigued (although I have cfs/ME so I get this any time I'm ill) and have had some mornong headaches. I'm actually not that bad. My brains a bit fuzzy and if I get up for a while I need to lie down again. Tonight Ive got a weird tightness in my right chest which doesnt exactly hurt but feels odd. Ive got a sore finger too.

Really though I have been more ill (whooping cough/chest infections...)

As I'm a week in I'm properly hoping I've escaped the worst. I do know it can go downhill. I'm submitting oxygen sats each morning to the surgery and checking myself 3 x a day.

I still have no idea how I got it. I would so love to repeat the test /do antibody tests/test the family but we are pretty broke (covid...).

@BatleyTownswomensGuild - I really appreciated your list . Thankyou. I did email school and the husband and kids have sorted everything. I added treats to the shop (genius) and let them watch netflix. We've kept the homeschooling routine up as they pretty much do it themselves and I thought if I went to hospital my husband would need the structure for them.

@hopsalong I cant tell you how much your post helped calm me. I really did think I might leave them within 2 weeks and what did I need to do in that time. I mainly distracted with tv in the daytime but got anxious at night.

Wow @Howmanysleepsnow. Your husband really did have low sats. Im glad hes okay. I spoke to my doctor who has me monitoring sats and 94 or below and I would be in hospital - I was sure that would happen but hasnt (yet... a few days to go)

Thanks eveyone else.

I can only assume I have a low viral load or delayed positive?! This week has been one the scariets of my life.

I really wish I could test more to know whats been going on.

@dottiedaisee wow that shows how it spreads doesnt it . It makes me so happy the staff were all okay. Im so sorry about the residents.

Its a strange one isnt it. Our local paper says the emergency mortuary is being opened and someone 32 died recently. You see in the national news of those in 40s dying and as Dr Xand got it badly it did scare me. A friends husband is super fit and was compeltely floored (but didnt go to hosptial). I am surprised that although Im knocked out and have a cough I am not worse.

You need to be sensible and stop reading the scary stories and concentrate on feeling well again. I think its quite hysterical thinking you are going to die when you are feeling okay. You only hear about the worst on TV. Turn the thing off, get rid of the news, read some books and just relax.

Opening windows, isn't that something everyone does anyway? We sleep at night with the window ajar for air and every morning I open all the windows to air the house?

Just go with how you would with anything else. If you are struggling to function, go to hospital/call a doctor. Otherwise manage it at home like anything else.

Back I'm less anxious now I'm a week in.

I'm clinically vulnerable for several times over - so no, i dont think it was "hysterical" wondering where it would lead when I was first diagnosed. Symptoms develop with covid (day 7 -10 it can drop suddenly) and have you not seen the huge number of deaths? Id be one of those classes as "with underlying symptoms". Many many people have covid and have problems one way or another, especially if they have a colldction of risk factors. My own doctor was talking about going into hospital at the drop of a hat to ensure I went in early (due to risk factors) but was also reassuring about he number who survive

But hey thanks for coming on to say that to me. Kicked any puppies before breakfast?

And no I wouldn't wait til I was struggling to breathe - I'd go in the moment my sats dropped to 94. But glad you feel you know better.

Glad the list helped OP.

If you're already half way through the 14 day period and functioning ok, that's great. And keep using your oximeter so you can spot any potential issues as early as possible.

Sounds like you are doing great though.

Think about it this way, you've been living with the shadow of this over you for a year. Once you are out the other side, think what relief you will feel. (Still have to follow the rules obviously, but you'll have antibodies that will probably carry you through until you get two shots of a vaccine. )

Thanks Batley. I feel incredibly lucky and assume I must have got a low dose.

I will still keep checking the oximeter.

And yes I have begun to think that. A year of us living under this fear and the relief that I won't have to panic. I'm bizarely excited about being able to go to the supermarker rather than waiting for a weekly shop. The weeks we ran out of bread /telling kids we cant have x until saturday etc./no they can't meet up. All fine but will be so strange living without that fear.

Im group 6 for the vaccine so hoping that the antibodies will ses me through and I can relax (obviously while sticking to the rules). We agonsised over sending kids to school in Jan and in Dec - it will be so good not having that fesr that sending them could harm me.

Thanks again xx

Oh I so feel for you, your distress is palpable 😔 You must have been so frightened.

You are obviously well informed and have a good GP. You can get through this.

You might be interested in listening to this audio book by a genius doctor who has a magic touch for helping anxiety sufferers.

www.audible.com.au/pd/Hope-and-Help-for-Your-Nerves-Audiobook/B00FLI3DZK?source_code=M2MOR1341126180055&ipRedirectOverride=true&source_code=M2MOR131091619005N&ds_rl=1252391&gclid=EAIaIQobChMI8-3v2abD7gIVVxwrCh217Q_QEAAYASAAEgJqxvD_BwE&gclsrc=aw.ds

Changing I'm a week in and really not too bad so feeling much less anxious! When I started the thread I had just been diagnosed and was terrified. I really appreciated this thread but didnt update daily etc as I was avoiding covidy things for a bit.

I am glad you are feeling ok @TryingNotToPanicOverCovid

I’d like to apologise to you. I posted a while back that you were a bit dramatic and the odds were in you favour. I am ECV and had to have a test yesterday. I’ve had a tight chest, an internal temperature and bad headache for the last 3 days. I’ve tested negative thankfully but for a brief minute I did think what if the worse happens? What do I do with my son etc. So I completely get your thoughts, even if they are more extreme. I’m sorry if I caused any offence or upset.

Like others have said, if you are doing ok now, you should be fine going forward. Keep well and I wish you a speedy recovery