That Time I Caught Covid

Last month, I tested positive for Covid. I had woken up out of my sleep around 3am with this burning in my throat and I was having a hard time breathing out of my nose. What I assumed happened was that my nose must’ve been stuffed up while I was asleep so I automatically started breathing with my mouth open, which dried out my throat. I’m not sure…But I also woke up to a message that a friend I had recently seen tested positive. I took a test and sure enough…positive. I cannot even count how many covid tests I’ve taken over the last two years, but none of them have ever been positive before. 

I had no clear symptoms of covid prior to testing positive. I was very tired on the day before, but it was also our first field trip since 2019, so being tired made sense. The only other thing was that I was very cold. I had been wearing sandals in gray 60 degree weather and I thought that was why. I didn’t have a sore throat, cough, fever, sneezing, or any other symptom that would make me think I was even regular sick. 

If I had not gotten a message that my friend tested positive, I would’ve ended up testing on the same day anyway. I felt terrible the longer I was awake. I alerted my team and admin right away. I went to school to put out my sub plans for that day and lysol everything. I wore a mask and gloves and I was only there for about 20 minutes. As the day went on, my head started hurting and I started feeling really congested. Like all of a sudden I had all this mucus. I feel like everything happened so fast. I couldn’t breathe out of my nostrils, my head felt full, my throat was on fire, my head was throbbing, and I was incredibly anxious. Not about dying, but about the people I had been around. 

I took a home test that was positive and I took a PCR test that was initially negative. I was informed that sometimes that happens and to take another one because I had one positive test. False negatives are more common than false positives. People get so excited for a negative result, but it’s worth double checking if your home test was positive. At first I wasn’t going to, but I had to know.  

The second day was worse. Way worse. I could barely hear anything, I felt like I got smacked by a truck, I had a fever, my nose was stuffed up and I had so much mucus, it was even hard to breathe out of my mouth. I also began sneezing with my entire body. Thankfully, I never felt anything in my chest and my throat wasn’t on fire anymore. No respiratory symptoms at all. I was so tired. I had taken tylenol for the fever and body aches. I slept so much. My fever was still high even after tylenol. My body still hurt, but not nearly as bad and my ears kept popping like I was on a plane. 

A weird thing happened that day. I had tissue in my nose because it was running like a faucet, even though I couldn’t breathe out of it. So remember the whole body sneezing? Yeah, well I felt a big sneeze coming and before I could get the tissue out of my nose, I sneezed. All that pressure went inside. I felt something pop right under my boob. I was shocked. Like what did I just break from sneezing? Is this 30? No. It can’t be. I was very stiff and couldn’t move much on top of everything else that was happening in my body. I told my doctor and she said I had to go to Urgent Care because I may have cracked a rib. Girl, what?! From a sneeze? The Urgent Care doctors were real lax about me having Covid. I was more concerned than they were. I suppose this may be normal for them so they’re like what else is new. Thankfully, no cracked rib, but I did tear cartilage between my ribs. Yup. From a fucking sneeze. He prescribed me some pain meds and a nasal spray and decongestant because he said I sounded terrible. No shit, sir. 

At first, I couldn’t feel a difference with the medications, but after 2 days of pills and nasal spray, I was only congested in my head and I was still exhausted from simple tasks. On Friday when my job said I could come back Wednesday, in my head, I was like “I’ll need more time”. But by Wednesday, I was ready. Admin encouraged me to take more time if I needed, they said they had my class covered. I thought about it because I was still so sleepy. I had so much to do, though. I got sick at the wrong time lol 

Trust me yall, I’m not above taking off a day of work for National Margarita Day or just to take day naps. If I wanted to stay home, I would’ve. I felt no outside pressure to go back.  Admin was very accommodating and my team would continue to take care of my kids. I went back to work and somehow made all the things happen lol


I’d like to take a moment to express gratitude: 

I’M SO GRATEFUL I CAUGHT THIS AFTER GETTING PAST MY COVID ANXIETY! I think I would’ve passed out after that test was positive. I’m grateful that this didn’t set me back in my anxiety journey. Trust me, I had the thoughts. “See, that’s why you were staying home” “You were right to be anxious” “As soon as you start being a little free, you catch covid”...Those thoughts didn’t win. I know I’m risking covid every time I go hangout. I’m grateful no one I was around caught covid from me. I’m grateful to school admin and my team for not making me feel the guilt that I know others have felt when receiving positive covid tests. I’m grateful my friends were so available with love and support. I’m grateful my sister bought me a recliner on a whim! I’m grateful that my seasonal allergies started kicking my ass all the way in February. My doctor prescribed me this respiratory allergy medicine that, coincidentally, has been used to help with Covid patients!!! I just happened to do some research on things I could take to ease my symptoms that wouldn’t interact with my anxiety medicine and that came up. I’m grateful I got vaccinated and boosted. Yall I talked so much shit about that vaccine and got shot up as soon as I could lol. I’m very grateful that I didn’t lose my taste and smell! 

My only lingering issue is that my ears have been weird. It’s possible I have some sort of ear infection. Anxiety is saying I have a brain tumor. Isn’t that fun? My covid anxiety is gone, but girly still be struggling with generalized anxiety, especially when something feels off in my body. This ain’t about that, though lol anyway, my doctor referred me to an ENT.

I’m sure I’m forgetting something, but I don’t know what. So thanks for reading!