Remember the beginning of 2020? New year with the usual hopes and aspirations. Then we started to hear about a strange virus that reportedly started in China. I remember thinking..... China is far away, our medical team here in the US will be able to control this virus. That was the beginning, and looking back, what a year it has been. Lockdowns pronounced on senior citizen living facilities. We could not enjoy visits with our families. We could not show affection to our loved ones, no hugs, no kisses, follow rules staying 6 feet apart. Here we are in our senior years, needing love and support but now in emotional pain as we are forced into isolation. All of a sudden senior citizens became the subject of the news media. Those of us in that upper age bracket began to get the message. Our lives were in danger. The new virus, COVID, became our primary health concern. No longer were we to just die from 'old age' but now we were told COVID was our major life threatening illness. Hospitals were soon overrun with COVID patients. The death rate was alarming. Mortuaries had difficulty making room for more bodies. Suddenly we felt intense grief as our friends and loved ones died. We worried about ourselves. Would I now appear on the obituary page, as the next COVID victim?
In late April COVID hit home. Five of us residents, all housed in the same area, suddenly exhibited COVID symptoms. Included were my husband and myself. Now that I know a little bit more about COVID, I realize how easily it spreads......nasal secretions and saliva drops. Tiny, wet, common bodily fluids which all of us ooze all the time but the COVID virus has turned those tiny drops into killers! Dick, being 90 years old, was especially hard hit. First of all, I am so glad I decided to NOT send him to the hospital or else I would not have been with him during those precious last days. Dick began to breathe heavily, open-mouthed, harsh sounds, proving the COVID had invaded his lungs. At that painful moment, all I wanted to do was to surround him with love. Since the last bodily sense we experience is our 'hearing', I softly repeated again and again, "I love you, Dick, and I always will". Then suddenly, there was no further intake of breath, no sound, just silence. I kept repeating my love for him but I knew he was gone.
My symptoms with COVID continued. Then 2 nights later I fell on the floor in the middle of the night, hit my face, cut my skin around my right eye, suffered a black eye for about 3 weeks, all because I had become confused and disoriented. During those weeks, I brushed my hair and I discovered gobs of hair on my brush. I experienced hair loss! Fortunately, that lasted only a few weeks. But during that month, I suffered mentally, emotionally and physically.
Now it is 2021. On the morning of Thursday, January 21, I received the initial COVID vaccination. The injection was painless and I felt relief that now I was on the way to becoming totally safe from more COVID. But at 3:00 AM Friday morning I was awakened by shaking chills plus a hideous headache. Staff checked on me. Finally at 7:30 I was awakened and felt horrible. Unable to walk to the dining room I stayed in my recliner chair all day, my arm and leg extremities aching, my head pounding. Tylenol helped. But as I sat there I realized I was experiencing a severe reaction to the vaccine, with symptoms similar to my bout with COVID. Feelings of depression and helplessness engulfed me. Staff was concerned, checking on me frequently. These symptoms continued from early Friday morning until late Saturday night. At times I felt I was dying. BUT then Sunday morning I awoke in surprise. I felt great! No negative COVID symptoms. The bad reaction to the vaccine had ended.
On February 18, I am scheduled for my second COVID vaccination injection. No one can predict what I will experience. But if I do have a severe reaction again, at least I am prepared. Yes, the COVID story keeps going but let's all pray that our lives will return to normalcy soon.
