Third time covid positive since July

[alpenguin]

I can’t actually believe it. This is my third time with covid since July this year. Each spaced out around 6 weeks. I only just got my booster but it won’t have had time to work. Fingers crossed it does something as I’m not sure I can tolerate the antivirals again.

If Society are happy to support me being persistently ill without putting the fear of god into me with government assessments then I’ll accept society’s desire for the clinically vulnerable like me to stay at home. Then they can all continue get each other sick every few months.

Otherwise I need to work to support my family and cannot afford to keep catching this “just a little cold” that has permanently damaged my heart and lungs, left me with extreme fatigue and now floors me with acute symptoms due to a new variant every 6 or so weeks.

I’m going to lose my job and no one will take me on. I know those telling me it’s my responsibility, as someone with a medically suppressed immune system to keep away from people, are the same who’d call me a scrounger if I claimed sickness benefits to survive and support my kids.

I just wish people had some consideration for others. I wish people understood what it’s like being considered collateral damage so they can go to work and spread their germs freely. My life is clearly worth nothing. I hope someone explains that to my kids when this disease finally kills me.

Its shit. I have a CEV other half & I’m sick of hearing ‘it’s just a cold’. No one would spout that rubbish if they had a loved one as vulnerable as yourself.
Wishing you a speedy recovery op, hope you don’t feel too rough and manage to avoid further complications.

It is utterly shit and I can't understand current policy at all - it makes no sense. I'm so sorry.

My son had covid a few weeks ago, I told my manager and her response was… could we just call it a cold. I told her “I’m sick and tired of people referring to it as a cold. Standing a 3 year old in the shower at 3am and changing the bed because of sweaty sheets and coughing up shit, isn’t a cold”. Her response was, maybe he had the flu. I’m lucky as I volunteer and was in the position to tell her to fuck off, it’s not like she could sack me.

I work in education. We don't test. We go in if we are well and stay off if to sick to work.
I'm sorry you are struggling but everyone is.
People have to work and pay their bills.
We don't stay in for flu and colds.
We don't stay in for covid anymore.

that's working out so well for education and attendance isn't it

God you poor thing,I'm just getting over it and that was hellish ,I'm terrified of getting it again. Nothing like a cold or flu -which I've had twice. Still only 80% and I got it 17 September.

Your username speaks volumes.

Do you not think that I too have to work and pay the bills? Do my kids not need clothes or deserve to go to beavers or guides or whatever their peers do?

You are not sorry that I am struggling with a disease that has permanently damaged me and limited what I can do in my life. You do not care, the “but” in your sentence gives that away. As long as you get to live your privileged life, you do not care of the effect this disease has on the rest of society. Everyone is struggling? have you had to be off work 5+ weeks split into three separate episodes over the past 3 months due to different variants of an illness that society terms just a cold and so we have to live with it? Are you facing unemployment because your sickness record is awful, made worse by being disabled in the first place? Are you suggesting that I ought to struggle more in my life to make peoples work lives a bit easier? If you equate my experience to that of others then no, not everyone is struggling.

There’s a huge difference between finding paying your bills a bit harder and finding your entire life and home as you know it ripped away because you can no longer work due to ill health. Not everyone is struggling with that. Yet. But it’s what I’ll be returning to work to face.

The bounds of your empathy is not just unknown, it’s absent. Shame on you as an educator moulding minds with such a selfish individualist attitude.

I hope your son has recovered and that you were ok too. It’s so rampant in schools and nurseries so that kids are going to keep on getting sick and parents will have to keep taking time off to look after them or lie and send them in to infect everyone else. I’m glad you were in a position to tell your boss where to go.

I’m so sad that we live in a society where people allow employers to tell them what to do when ill. I despair for what we’ve become where going into work, which ultimately only benefits the employer, is seen as what is necessary when sick. I wonder what would happen if everyone who was ill took the time to recover fully before going back to work. Would the system grind to a halt? Maybe. Would it show employees that they are the ones who collectively hold the power? I’d bloody hope so.

Sorry, I’m ranting. Lying in bed having slept most of the day and being awake now gives me too much time to think in between coughs and sneezes.

Please take the time to look after yourself if you can and recover slowly. I was still going to bed at 7.30 with my youngest after getting it twice in the summer and now I have it again. Wish it was just a cold.

Thank you, I'm taking it very easy. The only reason I'm awake now is because I had a mega afternoon kip! 😴

One thing I've found really helpful is Metatone tonic.

Sadly I can’t take anything that has potential to boost my immune system as I medically suppress it.

if there’s anything positive to it being my third time, it’s that the symptoms aren’t lasting as long. That said the heart and lung damage came from the mildest dose of covid I had and that’s fucked me for life.

I'm with you, OP. This year has been nothing but Covid, I'm breathless on exertion after the last bout, I think I need to see my GP about it.. being issued a warning for my absence at work is the extra kick in the stomach.

I wonder if you aren't clearing the virus rather than catching it several times in quick succession. The anti virals seem to suppress it then it bounces back. DH tested positive on & off for at least 3 months after taking anti virals
I hope you feel better soon.

@alpenguin I ask this gently - are you masking when you go out? Do you use good quality ffp2 respirator masks?

I have found them to be very helpful.
It's annoying being the only one masked but it's worth staying healthy.

We also isolate and wear masks at home in common spaces when any of the children are Ill. I've avoided catching several colds from the children this way.

No I’ve had to take the other kind of tests not the Lft (can’t remember their name right now) the past two times and they’re different variants. I’ve been testing negative on Lft in between (I need to test neg before I can take my immunosuppressive medication).

I’ve been returning to life well enough but fatigued for four weeks and then someone I know gets it and like clockwork im testing positive again in 5 or so days.

Yes. I wear ffp3 masks but if no one else does then the risk of catching something is still quite high. More reduced than if I didn’t but it’s clearly not enough.

Like I said, short of quitting work and signing on the sick there’s nothing else I can do and even at that I have kids and a partner who cant isolate forever. People are selfish. If it became common practice to even just wear a paper mask when we start showing signs of any illness it would protect others but people think that’s a restriction of freedom rather than the freedom to choose protecting others.

@alpenguin with the greatest respect but the world has gone back to normal. We all can't isolate and test and wear masks forever.
I'm sorry you are struggling but I think it's just how it is now and it will never go back to testing, isolating and mask wearing.

This isn't normal though is it?

Sorry, as in saying we've gone back to normal only works if you pretend a whole heap of stuff isn't happening.

I don't see why we can't wear masks at least some of the time eg on crowded transport etc. I do. It does not inconvenience me or anyone else in the slightest.

@NotReadyForAutumnYet No I'm not pretending anything didn't happen.
I followed all covid rules and restrictions as I do now.
So I don't isolate, I don't have to test and I don't wear a mask.
So back to pre covid.
Back to normal

I'm talking about now. Things aren't normal - or not pre-covid normal anyway.

In what way?
I'm not talking war or politics.
I'm talking normal humdrum day to day life.
It's normal

So sorry OP, it shouldn't be like this and it doesn't have to be like this either, we know as a society what we can do to suppress covid, it's just that government have decided not to do any of it and it's the little people who are suffering, both with their health and finances. I would have thought more people would be taking precautions and looking out for each other in a cost of living crisis and with the NHS in meltdown, even if they're not personally worried for their own health but seemingly not.
Realistically, if you're wearing an FFP3 mask you're doing pretty much what you can as an individual and we need government to implement strategies and individuals to take reasonable steps too, like wearing a mask where appropriate and staying home if ill.
I wear an FFP2 everywhere indoors and use an antiviral nasal spray and CPC mouthwash, it's not easy being in a minority masking and trying to avoid infection, solidarity with you. (By the way an antiviral nasal spray and CPC mouthwash may also reduce your viral load and help you to clear it faster).

I hope you have a speedy recovery, and when you feel better if you have the energy, get involved in the campaigns to bring back masks in healthcare and get clean air in schools. Write to your MP and let them know how it's impacting you. I am hoping the next government will do better but in the meantime we have got to get through this winter, which isn't going to be any fun at all.

If you're on twitter btw, there's a great covid conscious community on there. Long covid day at the covid enquiry today and lots of campaigning and tweets related to it.

This is the stuff from Long Covid kids for example Hashtag For Hope Campaign For Long Covid Kids