[AE.Personal] Down with the sickness.
Hey, all.
So, I made it through a week of daily newsletter updates, and then got a decent start on this week... and then it fell apart. Mostly because I fell apart, physically.
Two members of my three-person household -- myself very much included -- are sick with a so-far unspecified illness. I don't think it's covid, though we're all vaccinated so it could be "mild covid" as opposed to "bad cold".
My understanding of the typical covid cough is that it's a dry cough originating deep in the lungs, where I've got more of a throat tickle situation going on, but my understanding is also that covid is unpredictable and can basically attack anything in the body.
My disability, being mitochondrial based, also can basically affect any or all of my body as it sees fit, and typically when I'm having an immune response I feel it in my joints and large muscles in the form of pain and fatigue and painful fatigue, which I've been coping with as best as I can (that is, poorly) all week, and I'm feeling pretty worn down. Any time I'm having severe fatigue, I also deal with a large degree of cognitive fog that makes writing difficult. For example, this newsletter has gone through multiple iterative drafts over the past few days.
There have been a couple of times in that timeframe where I thought, "Oh, this was a very mild infection and I've already thrown it off" and started resuming normal activities, only to have my body shut me down.
I'm monitoring my blood oxygen levels and so far, so good. We're trying to get a hold of some over-the-counter at home covid tests, mostly so we know how vigilant we should be being right now. Nobody in the household is interested in entering a medical facility if it's not absolutely necessary at this particular point in history. Right now we're just tired and grumpy, which doesn't seem like it requires medical attention.
Complicating things... today is the day we're expecting plumbers to come by and tear out our house's hundred-year-old sewer line. We had severe thunderstorms overnight and have been notified that the ground may be too waterlogged for them to do it today, but if not, then we're likely to have our water shut off for a good portion of the day which is not super ideal when we should be powerloading on fluids, but, eh. It is what it is. The nominally healthy member of the household was already our point person on this. Apart from possibly not having running water, it mainly affects me because I'm the cat herder of the household, but that's already handled for the day.
Whenever we have the sewer line replaced, it's going to be the start of a series of repairs because they're going to have to demolish a portion of our front porch to do it, and that's going to be a lot to deal with, logistically and financially, but one thing at a time... at least to the extent that life allows us that luxury.
Assuming we find out that our front yard and porch aren't being torn up today, I'm going to put in a delivery order for the drug store for general cold/flu supplies and (if available) tests and then go back to bed. If work is proceeding, I'll probably still be going back to bed, though I suspect I'll be less likely to sleep, and probably set the delivery for the evening and update the handoff instructions as needed based on the state of our porch.
So that's what's going on with me. Definitely sick, probably not covid, prepared to find out. Hope you are all safe and well as you can be, under whatever circumstances you find yourself.