Dopers who speculate they have (have already had) COVID-19

The Quarantine Zone
1

I’ve seen others speculating in other threads, so I thought we could all muse in one place…

Oh, I’ve definitely been sick, but it’s fading, and I do think it’s possible it’s the Virus. (It’s a fantasy in that it would be oh.so.much.better to have been through it than get it later…) Here’s my story.

I’ve been working in Mobile, Alabama, where cases are scarce, but a couple weeks ago I went back to my hometown of Indianapolis, and my girlfriend was sick. She’s a social worker who had been (but no longer is, thankfully) seeing people in their homes about their health benefits through a major insurer’s Medicaid program. I.e., mixing with the peeps. Plenty of opportunity to pick something up. But she never speculated herself that it could be It, and she has had some other stuff off and on for a bit, so I didn’t think much of that.

In terms of my symptoms, it’s been a bit unusual. No fever (it seems, though I haven’t had a thermometer on me and haven’t taken my temp). A bit of a dry cough. But here’s the kicker: in proportion to the lack of symptoms overall, I’ve felt shit-kicked by whatever this is. No, not the worst malaise I’ve ever had–not by far. But I’ve never had malaise this bad without a lot of other pretty bad symptoms to go along with it.

Achy. Lethargic. Pain in my eye sockets. And it’s just felt different. Like a raging beast that didn’t manage to take me down the way it wanted to but did get its claws in me a bit.

I could be totally wrong. This could be some generic “virus.” But it seems to match pretty closely the “mild symptoms” I’ve read about. And I’m inclined to believe there are already a lot of people who have this thing and don’t know it.

In any case, fingers crossed. I have not seen anyone around me get sick, which is good. (I went back to work after I got back from Indy, but the symptoms came on gradually and peaked the following weekend. I was also doing some pretty brutal interpretation on a galvanizing line, walking up and down stairs, and I think I confused the lethargy with fatigue from that. Again, no other big symptoms were present to say, “You are sick, dawg.” If I did anything wrong, it was going back to work the next week, but I did stay home on Wednesday, thinking, “Wait, what if it is…”)

Thanks for your thoughts on the above, and what’s your story?

2

I’m wondering myself - 2 weekends ago I had aches and pains, mild fever (~99.5 F), runny nose, productive coughs, moderate fatigue/malaise. And I could barely taste anything for a few days. This coincided with the first weekend when we had a high pollen count, and I’m allergic to almost every pollen they test for, so I attributed it to that. But in retrospect, fever and aches/pains aren’t usually symptoms of seasonal allergies, and now I’m reading that losing sense of smell/taste is a common symptom of COVID-19. Whatever it was, I got over it, except for lingering usual seasonal allergy symptoms (including occasional coughs). My wife never got sick.

3

We humans get tons of viruses and feel like crap but just shrug it all off. Moreover, a single virus can give different people widely variant symptoms. We know COVID-19 can make you feel nothing at all–or kill you.

So I think your symptoms are compatible with the virus. Your wife may have gotten it too (or given it to you) but never felt symptoms at all. That’s the problem with this thing. Lots of unknowns/unknowables.

4

I had what I suspect was a very, very bad cold that started in early February, still fighting off the effects to this day, most notably the ongoing cough. It is finally giving over. I don’t think it was COVID-19 because no fever (although I didn’t check), no body aches, no headache, no loss of sense of smell. Tons of snot, to not put too fine a point on it. Still, there is just that nagging notion…

This is exactly why we need widespread testing for everyone who wants it. If you both have had it, then you’re two of the few who have some immunity and who could be cleared to safely return to the work force.

As soon as possible, I hope you can both get tests to confirm your suspicions.

5

Last fall, I had a cold (or so I thought), and a couple days after I thought I had recovered, it “came back.” I just assumed that I caught a different cold virus, but I now think that I may very well have had COVID.

It wasn’t severe enough that I would have had to stay home from work if I didn’t already work at home; it just slowed me down a bit. Don’t remember if I had any reduction in my senses of taste or smell, beyond anything that routinely goes along with a stuffy nose.

6

I had a sore throat last Friday. It went away pretty quickly - but you never know.

7

In January I had a mild cold that lasted three days, with some aches. Followed by a MONTH of a dry cough. Each morning I would hack up a large volume of yellow-green gunk. For a MONTH. I never took my temperature.

I travel three times a month (normally)

I can’t help but wonder.

8

I came down with a cold that I got over two weeks ago. I also had a productive cough start the next day. I tend to get bronchitis when I get a cold, but it usually takes several days to kick in. I had a fever of about 100-101 for a while.

Its two weeks later and I still have some symptoms. Mostly a productive cough where my mucus is transparent, which I assume means the infection is cleared along with some fatigue.

Could be COVID, but I assumed it was just a cold.

9

This week I have had a lot of time on my hands, so I indulged in some long put off cleaning. In the process I raised enough dust, that my allergies kicked off. I was coughing, wheezing, a little short of breath, and feeling tired. It concerned me a little, so I stopped cleaning. I then magically got better. I guess I am allergic to dust(ing).

10

Interesting thread. Would people also mention their age?

In mid-December I had the Sore Throat from Hell. I’ve had lots of sore throats, but never one like that. Like swallowing razor blades. I went to a doc-in-a-box and they gave me antibiotics and steroids. The worst went away in about four days. But I lost my voice for about three weeks after that. And as Aspenglow mentioned, I blew my nose all day, every day. Went through tons of kleenex. Never had a fever to speak of, maybe 99-ish, from time to time. I didn’t have all over muscle aches, but had pain in my right shoulder for weeks that was so severe that I asked my oncologist for an MRI, because I was afraid it was a recurrence of cancer. (It wasn’t.) That pain continued through January and eventually went away. I didn’t feel fully recovered till mid-February. I’m 71.

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A runny nose is apparently quite uncommon with covid-19, like less than 5% of cases. Sore throats aren’t super-common either. And productive coughs seem to be less common than a dry cough.

I think it is just as likely or probably more so you just got a chest cold. Remember it is the season for those things as well. It’s a dilemma. Really anyone with a cold symptoms should be getting tested just to be sure, but due to the lack of test kits people like you with mild, controllable symptoms that don’t completely overlap don’t seem to be high enough up the priority chain yet( according to anecdotal evidence in my area, anyway ).

12

I work at a university where there have now been four confirmed covid cases. About two weeks ago I started to get a sort throat that felt weird. Not worse than other sore throats I’d had, just odd. It concerned me enough that I bailed on my Sunday School commitments on the 15th, though I did go out a little bit in public generally for a couple of days after that. Tuesday I just completely stopped going anywhere, and also all of my family except high-school daughter who had important exams. Wednesday I developed a dry hacking cough which is still there now, and I can feel gunk in my lungs. As of a couple of days ago, my husband is also starting with the sore throat and a cough. No fever - but an eighth of the cases don’t have a fever, and that’s one long-ass incubation period

I had the opportunity to Discord-chat with one of my daughter’s friends over online tabletop cards the other day. She and her mum are voluntary-quarantining with a completely different set of symptoms than me - fever, no cough. But we do agree on all having an experience of feeling worse for a couple of hours, then better for a couple of hours, and basically cycling through like that all day. Which is also kind of unusual.

My symptoms are nothing much, and in normal circumstances I wouldn’t even think twice about them. I just think that at the moment I really have to assume that it’s the virus, because someone has to have one of these ultra-mild cases that reports talk about, and I’m a prime candidate for that.

13

My anecdotes just got confirmed minutes ago in an e-mail from my HMO - At this time, testing isn’t recommended for people with mild or moderate symptoms…

It’s a sad state of affairs.

14

Yes! Same thing here. I will feel really perky and then… Wow, this seems kinda, uh, dangerous, you know? Like I will crash really hard and then just be better. This has also struck me as different from other colds, etc., I have had.

I am 48, BTW.

15

That’s what’s driving me crazy. I really don’t think I have it. I have a mild upper respiratory cold, maybe complicated by allergies. This is something I frequently get at around this time of year. But I seem a little bit sicker this time. I have a low grade headache. I sometimes nap in the afternoon and wake up disoriented, which usually only happens when I’m genuinely sick. But this is more likely caused by stress and my general sleep difficulties. I think.

I was in New York City at the beginning of the month I took a plane there and back and spent 3 days eating in restaurants, taking mass transit, and staying at a hotel. And when I got back I spent a lot of time visiting an adult nursing facility.
But it would be kind of a stretch on the timing, it was a full two weeks after my return- I think, the cold crept up on me slowly over several days. And I haven’t had a fever, not even low grade. I haven’t come close and I have been diligently checking.

Who knows. What I have isn’t that bad and doesn’t fit the symptoms but sometimes there are no symptoms at all so who knows. That is the loop I’m stuck in.

ETA : I’m 62.

16

Wow, yeah. That’s pretty lame, actually!

17

I screened positive, but no test, ‘cause I’m not in the NBA. I do not in fact think I have it. But I’m obeying the quarantine.

18

At the beginning of this articleis a chart that compares the symptoms of cold, flu, and COVID. The rest of the article is interesting, too, about one woman’s experience.

19

Interesting thread, seeing that lots of people appear to have gotten it and don’t know it.

My story, Mid-Feb: Kiddo on a round-the-world trip, and became sick while in Singapore. Spent 5 extra days recovering and Singaporean doc says probably sinus infection, free to travel home. No Covid test given.

Arrives at our house after traveling through 17 int’l airports. Five days later I’m sick. Seems like normal cold, except dry (unproductive) cough, and the final days hacking up unusual amount from lungs. Since I have almost no sense of smell anyway, can’t account for that symptom. Decide to isolate for 2 weeks just to be sure. Not pure quarantine, just very minimal contact and insane cleaning around my environs.

No one else gets sick, and my voluntary 2 weeks are up today. Was it or wasn’t it? May never know, but the last half was really weird for a cold.

20

My gf (61) and I (62) returned from the Caribbean January 18/19 2020 when all this was first hitting the news. Our flight out of Sint Maarten was delayed, so we missed our connection and spent a night in Philadelphia.

A day or two after arriving home, we both started feeling blah. I assume I had a fever (chills, couldn’t get warm). My gf had a sore throat followed by a cough that kept her out of work for 5 days. After two days of fever I developed severe diarrhea that lasted two days. A few days after my recovery I developed a cough that lingered for a couple of weeks.

We both considered the possibility that we’d had “the virus”, but the lack of spread to others we were in contact with makes me question this.