Haunted by last February

It’s February 1st and I feel a bit of dread. You'll see why:

Feb. 2019: my cousin Jon fell and broke his hip. It was a long recovery that I was involved in every day.

Feb. 2020: the last completely normal month before the pandemic changed everything about the way we lived.

Feb. 2021: After 11 months of being vigilant as can be, one 10 minute unmasked conversation resulted in a Covid infection for me. The “original” Covid.

The anniversary of my Covid infection is haunting me the most. I’ll never forget the phone call from the person I had that one unmasked conversation with, telling me she had Covid. I felt completely fine. It seemed impossible to go from life as normal to feeling I should isolate from the rest of the family as soon as possible. Steve bought some snacks and magazines for me on his way home, “just in case” I ended up with Covid and had to hole away in our bedroom. His school nurse advised that I isolate even though I didn’t have symptoms, because we wouldn’t regret it. 

She was right.

I went into isolation on Thursday, Feb. 11th and just an hour before leaving for my Covid test on Saturday, started coming down with chills. I remember crying as I told Steve I knew I had it. It was a feeling of dread like no other. Had I given it to Steve, the kids and Jon? How bad was this going to get? So many scary unanswered questions. I made it home from the test and Steve was standing outside with a N95 mask on, waiting for me. I climbed upstairs and collapsed into bed. I slept for hours in various stages of chills and fever. Steve still tells me how worried he was about me.

I got through the worst of it in 48 hours. But my isolation, already 5 days in, still had 7 days remaining.

I was fortunate. I never had breathing issues, or long haul Covid. I did, however, lose my smell and taste on Day 10 after being exposed! So in addition to being isolated from everyone, food and drink was tasteless. When you subtract taste and smell, all you have left is texture. It was unpleasant. It lasted over three weeks.

I lived alone in my bedroom for 12 days. While it was a common joke about how nice it must have been to have a personal retreat, it was anything but. We have one bathroom. Using it meant I was breathing my Covid germs into the same small room that the rest of the family had to use. I wore a mask and wiped down everything each time. I was so nervous of one of the four of them catching Covid from me. When just using the bathroom raises anxiety, you know this isn’t any kind of personal retreat. Quite the opposite.

Steve faithfully brought me breakfast, lunch and supper for 12 days. That’s 36 meals. He held down the entire house. The kids, the meals, the dog, the wood stoves, you name it. My mother in law grocery shopped for us and brought us everything we needed and then some. Friends dropped off pizza and cookies and all the goodies you can imagine. If you remember in those original Covid times, the entire house had to quarantine. This was an incredibly trying time for each of us, but I will never forget the kindness of family and friends who helped us get through it.

Now, as we approach February 8th, I am haunted by the way the sunlight falls on the snow in the late afternoon. You see, I kept a routine for myself on those days I felt well enough. Part of that routine was that every afternoon, I brought a chair over to the window in my room, opened the window, and took in fresh air. That was my only view of the outside world. It was lonely. Yes, I had phone calls and video chats. I binged two great TV shows. But when you can’t go beyond one room for almost two weeks? The days are very long. The hours drag. 

Our reward for being so careful? No one else in the house came down with it (and this was pre-vaccine).  The 12 hard days felt worth it, in the end. 

Now it's time to make supper… what a blessing to walk downstairs, maskless, and be a part of this family and home that mean so much to me. It's cliche, but you never realize the beautiful life you have until something like this happens.