A couple of takeaways, in no particular order, from my experience with Covid-19 thus far:
- If you don't feel well, and you think you might have Covid - GET TESTED. #knowyourstatus
- If you wake up one morning and you feel like you got run over by a dump truck while you were sleeping - GET TESTED. Based on my experience with this virus, and an overwhelmingly large majority of the people I know personally that have or have had Covid in the past....this symptom is/was by far the most common 'first symptom' we experienced.
- If you don't feel well, but don't have a temperature - you could still be Covid-19 positive. I took my temperature many many times and only once was my temperature slightly above normal (100.1)
- If you don't feel well, but you still can smell and taste things as normal - you could still be Covid positive. This is one of the biggest mistakes, according to the nurse practitioner that read my Rapid Test result. I'm guilting of being one of these people... Fore example -- if you, or one of your kids, gets a sore throat, you immediately ask, "can I/you smell and taste?" Yep! whew, I don't have Covid. That's a dangerous decision making model to follow. Again, I'm guilty of it myself. The only reason I'm writing this is because my symptoms started Wednesday morning. I tested positive Friday afternoon. Friday evening my mom dropped off some of her amazing homemade Chicken Noodle Dumpling Soup. It was sooooo good. So good in fact that I heated up another bowl for breakfast on Saturday morning. Poof, taste was gone and so too was my smell. Point is, I lost my smell/taste on Day 4.
- Lastly, if you have Covid and you live alone AND you lose your smell and taste.... make sure your milk doesn't go past the expiration date. The ole' sniff test won't be possible. (this happened to me, lol)
- If you can't smell, avoid cleaning with bleach based products, or anything that might have harmful fumes. Now that I am feeling better, I have started to clean (bathrooms specifically). That's when I realized that I was dizzy from the fumes that I couldn't smell. Lesson learned.
- Lastly, shout out to those who have dropped off care packages on my porch, ran errands, picked up this and that.... I'll never be able to express how much these small acts of kindness meant to me. I plan to pay it forward as soon as I have the chance (post-quarantine which ends Jan 17th).
- Ohhhhh and in case you're wondering.... pups are great! It didn't matter how sick I felt, I still took the same care of my babies as I did before I got this bastard virus. I also had a contingency plan in place in the event that my oxygen levels dropped below 90 and I had to be admitted to the hospital. 92 was as low as I got, and back up to 96-97 now.
- *Disclaimer - I am no medical expert, and I did not stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night.... just stating my opinion based on the experiences of a relatively small group of family/friends/friends of friends/my own.