Too Much Tequila, Too Little Sunscreen

“Did you see those people?” I ask Linda, “They’re wearing masks.”

“And look at those lines at the cash registers. Everyone is spaced apart. Do you suppose that’s ‘social distancing’,” she asks knowing the answer.

It’s mid April, 2020 and we’ve just arrived at our daughter’s in Phoenix. We stopped at a grocery store to shop for tonight’s dinner, and we see our first signs of the impending pandemic. So far, the only new behavior we’ve seen in Deming is the almost comical stock-piling of toilet paper. Our two local markets are completely out of stock. Is that how we plan to combat the coming Corona virus, by hoarding toilet tissue?

On our way home we talk about what we saw in Phoenix and decide we’re going to follow all of the guidelines being advocated by the experts: masks, social distancing, frequent hand washing, and quarantining at home. I’m especially worried about Linda, she has an impaired immune system due to a medicine she takes for something totally unrelated. We agree that I will do the shopping and run all of the errands, while she stays home. I tell her to stock up on reading material and puzzles because it’s going to be a long summer.

We live like this for nearly six months when Linda and her friend decide that we should get together once a week for an evening together. We start playing Scrabble at each other’s house on Friday evenings. They are the first guests we’ve had in months and we’re thrilled to be living a somewhat normal life again, even if only for only a few hours a week. We’re healthy, the hors d’oeuvres and wine are great, but more importantly we’re with friends, and we’re having fun.

That was until a Tuesday afternoon when we learn that our friends have both tested positive for the Corona virus. We rush to the hospital to take our tests. We pace the floor for three days waiting for the results. When the call comes in from the New Mexico DOH, we hug, answer it on our speaker phone, and break out in tears when we learn that we both tested positive. We’re healthy, but well into our 70’s, and Linda has a number of underlying medical conditions. We wonder without saying aloud, “Have we just received our death sentence?”

I read everything I can find, which isn’t much, on the virus. It seems that fever, chills, shortness of breath, and the loss of the sense of taste are the first symptoms we should expect. But, the first changes we notice are a worsening of Linda’s nausea and diarrhea and my on-going sinus infection has moved into overdrive.

Two days later I can’t get out of bed. I feel so-so, but I don’t have enough energy to do anything other than stagger to the bathroom. Linda is still nauseas but she is up and around and taking care of me.

And so it goes for many, many days. My fatigue becomes more severe. I don’t have the strength to think, talk, read, or watch TV. I just lie in bed and stare at the walls and the pictures of our grandchildren on our bedside bookcase. The smile on my grandson, Tim’s face is my only link to reality. One morning I have to call Linda because I don’t have the strength to unscrew the lid from my toothpaste. Is this what the end of life is like?

Additionally, I lose my appetite and have an upset stomach, but I’m too tired to care. I soon develop a big-time case of the chills. I wake up in the wee hours of the morning freezing and shaking so violently that I’m sure the end is near. I fear I’m going to freeze to death in my own bedroom.

The report from our friends, the Scrabble players, is not good. She is on oxygen and in a wheel chair while he is doing a little better. He is taking care of her much like Linda is me.

Early one morning I have to go to the bathroom. I swing my legs to the floor and try to stand. I fall. My legs don’t work. It’s as if they aren’t connected to my body. I can’t move them. My legs aren’t numb or anything, they just seem disconnected from my nervous system. Linda and our son, Rob, get me back in bed, and Rob calls an ambulance out of fear and desperation. The EMT comes, tests my oxygen level, pronounces me within range, wishes me luck, and leaves. He wants no part of a virus infected family or their house.

I don’t know how I look but Linda and Rob are scared, really scared. They load me in the car and take me to the emergency room at our local hospital. She knows that our local hospital is not seeing or treating Corona virus cases, but she doesn’t know what else to do.

Linda parks and leaves me in the car while she runs inside. Soon an orderly comes out with a wheelchair and wheels me into a separate room through a private, side entrance. They aren’t letting me anywhere near the ER, the lobby, or the rest of the hospital. I’m in quarantine, in a cell. A nurse comes in, wearing two masks and layers of protective gowns. She takes my vitals and tells me the doctor will be in shortly. I lie there for two hours or so before the doc finally comes in wearing an outfit similar to the nurse’s. He stands back careful to not to touch me or anything else in the room. He quizzes me on my symptoms and leaves. The nurse comes back into the room and tells me I am being released and the doctor has called in a number of prescriptions for me.

Linda brings me home and our son goes to pick up my drugs. I lie in bed anxious to take the medicine that was just prescribed. Maybe I’ll finally feel better, or even recover. Rob brings home a dozen bottles of vitamins and minerals, most of which are to strengthen my immune system. It is then that I realize that I am on my own. I have to fight and cure this cursed disease all by myself. I can’t expect any help from the medical community.

The days drag on. I’m not getting any worse, but I’m not getting any better either. I just lie in bed staring at the walls. Then the call from hell comes. Our friend has just passed away. He was taken to the hospital for pneumonia three times and on the third time his heart gave out. But his wife, once the sickest of our group, is recovering.

After sixty-five days, weak but properly dressed, I go back to the hospital for testing. I test negative.

Hooray! I did it. I licked it. I’ll survive.

 ***

As I’m writing this I’m reminded that I haven’t fully recovered or think I ever will. I’m really lazy now, too lazy to do almost anything other than the smallest chores. I wrote my first short story last week. The first thing I’ve written in over eight months. In addition to laziness, all of the little health issues I had before COVI-19 now seem worse. My sinuses run constantly, and I have a host of other little annoying things to deal with. And, even more disconcerting, I now feel old for the first time in my life, really old. Old!

I’ve talked to my doctors and read articles about the lingering effects of COVID, but no one seems to know anything. So, I developed two theories:

Theory 1. My immune system had to ignore all of the other things going on with me so it could focus exclusively on the deadly virus. It beat the virus but had to let the other stuff go unchecked for a couple of months.

Theory 2. Over two months of total bed rest has had a lasting negative effect on me. Being immobile and doing absolutely nothing accelerated my aging. I feel as if I’m at least five to ten years older now than I was just a few months ago.

Old and lazy, but alive!