I feel terrible (not Covid) so how bad will Covid be….!!!

[Toria84]

I went for a test as I developed a cough, hot dry throat, runny nose, feeling very achy, fatigued.
Last night I had a raised temp (37.4 but for my that is raised)

Results have come through this morning as negative.

I’m guessing I have a cold, but I don’t ever remember feeling this terrible with just a cold before.

It’s making me wonder just how bad Covid is going to be if/when I do get it.

DS tested positive last month but the rest of us managed to avoid it!

There are a lot of nasty bugs going around at the moment which aren't covid and because of lack of exposure people's immune systems aren't as good as they would have been. We are on our 4th week of a evil toddler cold/virus all tests negative. I think we have forgotten about how horrible other day to day illnesses can be!

I have my first cold since Dec 19. It's absolutely horrible, I feel so bad.

I've done pcr tests and lots of lateral flows. All negative.

Must admit I'm dreading this winter as I'd forgotten how ill I feel when I get these bugs

Hi OP
We've got 'just colds' here (yes negative PCR tests) but feel much much worse than the families who have known Covid - mild symptoms if any all round. Frankly me and DH have felt absolutely atrocious with some previous bugs - and were left with symptoms that lasted months / almost a year in DH case. So I'm afraid I can't buy into the Covid is going to be awful or long Covid is something new narrative

There's now some evidence of cross-immunity between different coronaviruses, so being infected with this, plus being vaccinated obviously, should give you good protection for a while!

The whole Covid thing is so unpredictable
I have mild symptoms and kept getting negative Lateral Flow tests (only testing because a friend turned out to have COVID recently)
This morning - positive lateral flow test.

My symptoms are mild, but I do have slight backache too - which doesn’t go with a cold.

But overall, I wouldn’t be giving this virus a second thought if it wasn’t for the pandemic.

I absolutely know Covid can be a lot worse for some people. It’s just so unpredictable

I don't get this attitude of testing constantly till you get a positive.

If you're feeling rotten whether it's covid or not, stay at home and treat the symptoms ..

I think we are getting too focused on covid and losing a lot of common sense re our health

Get well soon op

@ADreadedSunnyDay

Hi OP We've got 'just colds' here (yes negative PCR tests) but feel much much worse than the families who have known Covid - mild symptoms if any all round. Frankly me and DH have felt absolutely atrocious with some previous bugs - and were left with symptoms that lasted months / almost a year in DH case. So I'm afraid I can't buy into the Covid is going to be awful or long Covid is something new narrative

Unfortunately it's person specific and that's the issue paper doesn't relate if unvaccinated it can still be pot luck.

The good news is vaccination does for way more people cut it to a mild case and reduce the risk of long covid.

As someone who was very ill with covid at 34, fit healthy walking 15+ miles a week paddleboarding twice a week but with mild asthma and am 5 months into long covid fatigue levels, daily muscle pain and daily headaches I can tell you long covid definitely exists! The new aspect has also been shown with blood test research studies BTW which is due to be expanded as people with long covid have a different set of detectable antibodies as it's thought the immune system is in over drive and attacking itself.

@frasersmummy
I wasn’t constantly testing till I got a positive.

I very much didn’t want to get a positive result. But I had plans for tomorrow and this weekend and I needed to know I was safe to continue with those plans.

Any other time I would have continued with the plans - meeting a friend for lunch here/ travelling to the Central Belt at the weekend. But if this turned out to be Covid (as it has), I didn’t want to risk passing it on to others - because it’s manifestation is so unpredictable.

FWIW I have been cancelling and more or less isolating already this week just in case.

@Scottishskifun
I don't dispute that some people have experience nasty symptoms after Covid - my issue is that this is nothing new.

Many other viruses cause similar longer-term issues. My mum was dismissed by a GP three years ago for just having a 'nasty virus' - she ended up in hospital with fluid around her heart and suffered fatigue for a long time afterwards. Apparently not that uncommon post-virally for some people. So instead of focusing on 'long Covid' and having 'long Covid clinics' why not have clinics or research on all ' long post viral symptoms'?

Sorry you still aren't feeling great. Any illness which causes long term symptoms is problematic

@ADreadedSunnyDay sorry to hear about your mum.
The difficulty with long covid is the range of symptoms and how to treat them. It has been found to be new as it appears to be a immune system attack and the frequency rate is much higher compared to other post viral illnesses of unvaccinated or if you have particular risk factors (one being female another is asthmatic). Its the shear numbers which have led to long covid clinics and some of the hospital ones seem to be helping people. Their effectiveness is very much area dependent and set up dependent.

In Scotland there isn't long covid clinics but GPs have no idea what to do, where to refer to (as most test results come back normal or clear) or what to do next. My GP is completely unable to explain why my body had a daily fever for 7-8 weeks for example.

This is what makes it new. There are definitely overlaps with other illnesses and a lot of advice for instance comes from ME specialists on fatigue management for instance. But when you have an estimated million people trying to live with this in a very short time frame it's right to try and support those huge numbers.

@Scottishskifun
Hope you get the support you need. Sadly it's not uncommon for people to be left in the lurch with long term health issues (regardless of what caused them).

I had bad flu a couple of months ago. PCR - negative. My cleaner caught the same virus I had (also PCR negative) and ended up in hospital one evening and needing an inhaler. (She was in and out and recovered fully)
She caught actual Covid a while afterwards and barely suffered.