I have perhaps twenty more years of life left in me. Maybe less. Maybe a lot less.
The years have been kind. The years have been brutal. I have experienced great joy as well as great sorrow. Through it all, I hoped for a tranquil journey. Through it all, tranquility has been elusive. Fleeting glimpses here and there. Moments of contentment were rare.
But I had hope. I believed in someday. If I were organized enough, if I worked hard, if I was a good person, if… if…if… all would be well. Life would be like boating on a placid sea with a colorful sail rippling in the gentle breeze of deep summer.
I handled the chaos. The stress. The upheaval.
I was often overwhelmed, but I continued moving forward. I tended to my child, who was and is the love of my life. I tended to my house. I tended the garden that brought me glimpses of tranquility when hummingbirds fed at the trumpet vine. I tended to my job. I was not so good at tending to my spouse. We divorced just shy of our twentieth anniversary.
These past twenty years as a divorced, perimenopausal woman have been chaotic and heartbreaking. I often quip that my New Year’s resolution is to be bored. I have been accused of being dramatic, but the drama invaded my life uninvited. I did not conjure it, nor did I encourage the spectacle.
When sent home to quarantine during the pandemic, I hoped for three weeks. Three weeks to hole up in my house and find my equanimity. Three weeks to figure out my life. Three weeks to decompress, regroup, and emerge again fortified and ready to take on the world.
The previous year had been eventful — much of it in not a good way. Still, there were things to celebrate. I turned 60, and my only child had a small destination wedding in Spain. I was the only person on my son’s guest list able to attend. His father had health issues, his grandmothers were too old to make the trip, and so on.
With some trepidation, I planned my first solo international vacation. I raided my 401K and gifted myself an epic two weeks on the island of Ibiza. It was my 60th birthday present to me. The expense was considerable. It was also my only child’s wedding. It was an escape from the stressfest that was my life, and I pulled out all the stops. Sixty! Who would have believed such a state was possible?
Writing Prompt from Lee Martin: Choose someone from your past whom you haven’t seen in several years. If you were to see them, what would you say and/or do?
I’ve missed her.
Dreadfully. It’s been a good long while now, too long since I’ve communed with her. The last time we interacted, she was just hitting her stride. And then her world fell apart – emotionally, politically, creatively, and physically.
The years have passed slowly in some respects and like a galloping racehorse in others. Any way you look at it, too many years have passed.
Hands on the banisters…tight, gripping…trying to catch my breath…heart racing. Doubled over.
I try to breathe normally.
Breathe.
Just breathe.
My breath comes back before my heart quiets. I finish the climb. Out of breath at the top. Again.
I stumble and stagger to the bed.
Laying my body down, the room spins. Ripples of nausea. My dachshund jumps on the bed and licks my face. She is worried. I am worried, too. She burrows under the blanket and curls up against my back.
I am still heaving. Trying to breathe.
Finally, it all settles down–my breathing, the nausea, the spinning. I curl and pull my knees into full fetal position. The dachshund nestles even closer, her nose cold against my back. I can sleep. And I do. Thirteen hours a day. Sometimes more. Rarely less.
They call it Long Haulers. They call it Long COVID. They call it Post COVID Conditions.
What I call it cannot be repeated in polite company.
I am so very weary of being tired, out of breath, aching, confused and scared.
Three years, six months, and ten days now since that phone call. Too anxious to wait any longer, I called the Health Department as soon as they opened. I have been sick for three days. They had tested me two days earlier.
I gave the woman on the other end of the phone my name. My date of birth. Last four of my social. She seemed surprised. “You’re positive.”
“What do I do now?” I could hear her shrug her shoulders.
“Call your doctor?”
I do. I’ve had the same doctor, Hyla, since 1998. She is very responsive. I can’t get through to her. I am surprised. I am desperate. I have the CORONA-19 Virus. I am trying not to panic.
In late 2020, the news outlets report health care professionals are overwhelmed. I am overwhelmed too and newly diagnosed.
I sleep. I call my doctor’s office. I sleep some more. I have a gruesome headache. The headache has been with me for so long, I name it Frank. It is already powerful – naming won’t hurt. I call some more.
I make a tele-health appointment to try and get Hyla’s attention. Finally, she calls. I ask her how long? I asked her if I will be okay? I askk her a lot of questions. She says, “We don’t know.” She says, “The recommended protocol is Vitamin C, Vitamin D, B12, zinc, magnesium, potassium. Arthritis Strength Tylenol. ICU patients show improvement with Pepcid, of all things.” She said, “Elderberry is showing some promise.”
She tells me what to look for and how I will know if I need to go to the Emergency Room.
“Don’t go if you don’t have to. Please.”
Three years, six months, and ten days now since the diagnosis. Before the vaccine. Before the antivirals. “My doctor said, “We don’t know.” Vitamin D. Vitamin C. The Bs. I take them all.
Three weeks after the diagnosis, I am somewhat better. I work from home, but I nap two or three times a day and sleep all night. I don’t know what is wrong with me. I think depression. But the headache?
I take the vitamins. The elderberry. The Pepcid. I sleep. I still have Frank-the-Headache for weeks and then months.
My doctor says, “We don’t know.”
After 9 months, finally, I am better. I shout ‘Hallelujah!’ on my social media.
This is premature.
A relapse.
“We don’t know,” Hyla says when I ask why it came back and how long it will last.
I am called back to the office in the town where I am employed after working at home for months. I discover I cannot walk. I cannot get from my car to my office. The drive has worn me out. Fixing breakfast, dressing for work and thirty minutes on the road might as well have been six months on the wagon trail. Casting off furniture like ballast. My old life gone like pianos sinking in the mud en route to Oregon.
I begin working at home again.
I am exhausted easily and often. I have a built-in seat in my shower. I could not bathe otherwise. I cannot stand but a few minutes or walk a few steps. My thoughts are cloudy.
I insist my doctor see me in person. Long COVID, I suggest. I have been reading the research buzz. I read abstracts online, mostly from the UK as they are releasing studies before the US.
“We don’t know,” Hyla says.
She says, “Good luck.”
I am not depressed, but I am. I develop anxiety.
Hyla says, “That, too.”
Many of us long-haulers do.
I break out in rashes.
“Yes, people report that.”
My old life is gone.
I enroll in a study out of Johns Hopkins. The questions go on and on and list all the possible permutations of Long COVID. I have kept my taste and smell but have no executive function. No cough to speak of, but the headache…Lord, the headache. Mercy, please. And then, body aches. Stiff joints. Hyla says I seem to be mimicking chronic fatigue syndrome.
“Good luck.”
I go back to work at the office. I feed the meter all day long via a phone app so I can park by the front door.
Three years, six months, and ten days now and they still don’t know much. I quit taking the zinc because I’m told to, but I can’t remember why. My short-term memory is gone. Some days my cognitive function is like swimming in a vat of molasses.
I am determined to reclaim my life. I join a yoga class. I can’t do it. Not even savasana–the one where you sprawl on the floor like a dead corpse.
I drop out.
I have failed beginning yoga. I used to take advanced classes.
Periodically, the symptoms abate. The headache is gone. I announce my recovery. I rejoice. Truly. Rejoice. I have hope again.
I feel almost good when I wake, though I tire easily. I tell myself I am just out of shape. Six to eight weeks of relative calm.
And then I relapse.
Another recovery. Another Hallelujah! Another relapse.
“We still don’t know.”
I am at the beach. My friends drive me to doors. Carry my things. It takes me half an hour to traverse the block to the chair they have set up for me as close to the boardwalk as possible. I discover I cannot stand in the wet sand. Can’t keep my balance when it shifts with the surf. I want to cry, but I laugh instead.
Long COVID is not going to beat me.
Three years, six months, and ten days. The WHO reports that 6,938,353 people have died from the coronavirus COVID-19 outbreak as of May 31, 2023.
For the 760 million people with COVID who didn’t die, 20% or more had or have Long COVID. Some for weeks, some for months.
Me? Three years, six months, and ten days.
My case is considered mild. I am one of the lucky ones. I did not die. I have not been declared disabled. I have not had to quit my job. I do not have to use a wheelchair or an oxygen tank. I have been fortunate. The initial illness itself, too, was mild. No hospital.
The doctor is as weary of saying “we don’t know” as I am of hearing it.
Elderberry. Vitamin C. Vitamin D. B12.
Lucky.
They begin to know some things. I am given Lorazepam for the anxiety and Modafinil for executive function. I have a rescue inhaler. They help but are not enough. I am not well, though I no longer have the headache. I begin to consider my future.
What if this is as good as it gets? This. Right now. Living this way.
It’s time to go to bed. I must climb the stairs to get there. It will take all the strength I have left. I will lie there for a few minutes, gasping, scared before I can breathe. Scared after. Still and all, I will settle into sleep to do it all again tomorrow.
The dachshund burrows next to me.
Three years, six months, and eleven days.
A long long-haul.
NOTE: This was written some time ago. The doctors have me on a drug cocktail that works for me. I feel infinitely better.
On a fine day in August of 2023, I turned 64 and was happy to do so.
Exactly one week later, I tripped over my suitcase and broke my right leg.
Yes.
Broke it.
(It’s not even a good story!)
I was visiting my son in upstate New York.
My health insurance is terrible, and an out-of-network emergency room visit was out of the question. Besides, I convinced myself it wasn’t broken, I could move my leg and wiggle my toes. Never mind that I felt it break as I fell.
I drove, yes drove, the 500 miles required to get to my beloved home. My leg seemed a tad better. I walked around on it for a week when it started swelling.
And swelling.
And I became afraid it would burst and I would fly around the room like a popped balloon.
I sought medical attention. “It’s broke,” the doctor said. I saw an orthopedist the next day who told me it was too swollen to do anything with or make an assessment, so they put me in a boot and sent me home for a week with instructions to stay off it.
I’ll not bore you with the antics of that very long week but suffice it to say I learned who my friends were.
Because I had walked on it that first week and despite the nature of the fracture generally calls for surgery, they determined it was “stable” and it was my choice to undergo the surgery or not.
I declined. (Insurance again.)
So. A few days went by with me dutifully wearing the boot. I was told to wear it for four weeks and then come in for a progress report.
After several days of excruciating pain and more swelling, I called and said, “Something is not right.”
They worked me in. I was told I was wearing the boot too much as I had taken to wearing it while sleeping as it minimized the pain.
So, I left. And followed instructions.
The swelling got worse. That balloon thing again.
They worked me in. Again. I was x-rayed and examined and told I should call my Preferred Provider for a lymphedema workup.
By this time in this story, I had been x-rayed so many times I glowed in the dark.
Somebody ordered an ultrasound to look for blood clots. I forget who.
Somebody called me with the results. Told me – I would swear to it – that I had a cyst in a lymph gland near my groin.
I got rather excited at that news.
Nobody else was, but, by golly, I was terrified.
COVID was surging along with the flu and a nasty virus.
I came down with the virus at Thanksgiving. Didn’t recover until January.
Finally, got my Preferred Provider to talk to me in a telehealth appointment. She read me the results. No cyst. I had an enlarged lymph gland. Not anything to be excited about. I was referred to a physical therapist who specializes in lymphatic massage and a vascular surgeon.
That word surgeon is rather scary. Don’t you think?
By that time, it was December. The broken leg no longer required a boot, but my right foot was so swollen shoes were a problem.
It took weeks before the physical therapist could see me.
I’m scheduled to see the vascular surgeon on April 4th. For the first time.
Now then. Some of you will remember that I have Long COVID. Well, the fun there just never ends. One of my symptoms is foot neuropathy which is a fancy way of saying my feet feel like they’re asleep all the time with the occasional shooting pains and electrical jolts.
Yeah. I’m a mess. They tell me the broken leg, the onset of lymphedema, and neuropathy are three unrelated problems. I’m having a hard time with that.
But, I think, I’ve been coping rather well. I’m seeing the physical therapist and her magic is of benefit, but the neuropathy is getting worse. Upon occasion, I wake up screaming in pain.
I’m hanging on for April 4th as I’ve convinced myself that the word surgeon isn’t quite so scary and that he or she will work a miracle.
April 2nd dawns with a tornado warning. I’m at work and we’re sitting in the basement of the building in this decrepit room and I’m staring at my swollen foot waiting for the storm to pass. I have this terrible sense of foreboding. Heavy, heavy dread.
We learn later that a derecho (straight line winds traveling more 240 miles) roared through as did fifteen tornadoes. Both phenomena are rare in the mountains.
Once we get the all-clear, I’m fixing to go home because I’m not fit to work. I feel awful mentally and physically. But I can’t. Downed power line in one direction. Fallen giant billboard in the other. I literally can’t get home.
Several hours later, the one road is clear and I head for my Beloved Barn.
Did I mention they clocked those winds at 91 mph at my local airport? Yeah. They did.
I arrived home to find my giant oak tree laying on my sanctuary, my heart, this pile of sticks I call home. It starts to rain. I start to cry.
I cannot tell how bad it is as it is getting dark. And raining. And I’m crying.
My dogs are in the house. I can’t safely get to the door. I can’t hear them.
I go into shock, I think.
I get in the car, and I drive to my lover’s home an hour away. I don’t remember much of the drive. My lover has no power, but he feeds me and puts me to bed. I don’t really sleep although I do have nightmares. Finally, it is daylight and I head for home with a quick stop to buy a dog crate and leashes and dogfood. Hope dies hard in my heart.
When I get here it doesn’t look as bad as it had in the dark. But still. Plenty bad.
I’m afraid the whole barn will come tumbling down, but I work my way to the front door, open it like I’m defusing a bomb, and my dogs come running out.
Hallelujah!
I rake a quick peek and hope rears again, but the real damage is likely to be to the roof and the second floor. No way am I going in. But in any event, it’s not a catastrophic loss as I had first feared.
Of course, there’s no power. Anywhere.
I sit in my car with my dogs and make phone calls. Cell coverage is spotty.
The woman at the tree service sounds manic, but she says, “Tomorrow.”
Tomorrow being April 4th.
I must cancel my appointment with the vascular surgeon in order to be here when they remove the tree.
Yes, really.
Thankfully, they reschedule me for April 18th – next week.
The tree is removed. Part of my old tin roof is missing on the portion that is still tin and not shingles, but the tree did not penetrate the roof. It’s a miracle.
Inch by slow inch, I go inside. I go upstairs. Nothing is collapsed. Nothing is knocked over. There is a crack in the drywall near the ceiling of the master bedroom, but it didn’t even leak.
I am blessed.
I crawl into my bed, with my dogs, in my beloved barn and I sleep nearly 24 hours.
When I wake, I am not refreshed. If this is what PTSD feels like, I have a new appreciation for traumatized folks and the effort they make to get through a day.
I give myself comfort care as much as I can with no power. I am not about to leave my dogs again and they don’t travel well. We are hunkering down.
The power eventually comes back on, and my crying jags begin to ebb.
I return to work on Monday.
But wait. There’s more.
The eclipse is Monday. I have the nifty approved glasses. I go outside and I watch the eclipse. But it’s an unpleasant sensation. My eyes are bothered. My greatest fear since I was a child was going blind. I continue to watch, very carefully positioning the glasses, but my eyes are watering and I am not enjoying myself. I go back inside.
I wake up in the wee hours of the morning with a red, swollen left eye and shooting pains. My eye is crusty with discharge.
I manage to find an eye doc that can work me in.
I am not going blind. But I have debris embedded in my eye. No. We don’t know what. I’m guessing oak tree fragments. He digs it out and applies a temporary contact lens as a bandage. I am instructed to return tomorrow.
Tomorrow was today. My eye should be normal by the weekend, he said.
Normal. What a concept.
The weather forecast for tomorrow is calling for rain, high winds, and possibly, yes, possibly, tornadoes.
W. Va. Fur and Root 