Glad you're both doing well, Squib, and best to your child especially.
Glad you're both doing well, Squib, and best to your child especially.
There's nothing civil about this war.
Thank you bluesOriginally Posted by blues
Our 2 year old has shown nothing
Children, with their thymus and immense T-cell repertoire, are likely to do well with this virus
My wife and I are presumably very early in course
It takes adults ~3 weeks to get very sick
The good news, is that I am guesstimating for every confirmed case in the US there is likely 50-100 actual cases
Between mild symptoms and significant ongoing barriers to testing, we know the prevalence is much higher
Of 120k confirmed cases in US, I feel we have between 6-12 million.
This does nothing to help the inevitable crushing of our hospitals, but I do believe we can achieve heard immunity quicker than people expect.
With an R0 of 2.5 we need 60% of population immune to halt outbreaks
Let’s be honest though, this honey badger virus has a higher R0 probably 4
With a 4, we need 75% or population immune
Given the fast spread, I believe most of the US will get this in next 6 months and we will achieve herd immunity quicker than we can get a vaccine. Unfortunately the # of deaths will be staggering.
I think you might win the first PF positive test?
I'm also in Boston, and work(ed?) right by MGH. Wife and I tested negative yesterday. Whatever I brought home (with the same symptoms) is responding to antibiotics.
I want to weigh in on this thread, now that I have more perspective. @GJM first off, glad you and the Mrs are felling better.
On Sun the 15th (Mar), I started noticing a mild sore throat—almost like a tickle. My wife noted that she had the same thing going on. By Monday evening, we were both feeling "punky," to use my wife’s words. (Like you, G, my wife and I known for doing *everything* together, up to and including team-teaching courses at the local universities). Given the national situation and zeitgeist, I made notes on the door calendar in our office and pressed on. By Wed/Thurs, were really were not feeling all that great; nothing I can point to specifically, but just overall fatigued, spacey, and not well. Out of caution, we are pumping the supplements, laying low outside of online teaching prep, and going to bed crazy early, and sleeping late, mostly unbroken. As an example, Wed night (18th) I went out to the garage with a Henry and an FO front sight that I’ve had on the to-do list forever. All my tools were GTG, so set up consisted of a safety check, and laying an old bath towel down. By the time I had tapped the old marbles out of the dovetail, and tapped the FO in, I was beyond wiped out, as in: do not pass go, do not collect 200 rounds of .22mag, go *directly* to bed. I felt bad enough that I was thinking that it was the onset of every other Covid article that’s been posted here over the last 2 months. I didn’t even have the energy to take my own temp, I just piled into bed, around 9pm, curled up in a ball, and hoped that I’d not need a vent in two days.
Next morn, both my wife and I started stirring at 10am. I’m talking unbroken sleep. I also felt fine, no fever, etc.
A much less severe version of this scenario played out each evening through the 26th or 27th. It may not be an exaggeration to say that both my wife and I have slept more in the last 2 weeks than we might sleep in a month during school. As many as 10 hours unbroken. Feeling fine in the am, and starting to feel pretty wiped by 6 or 7pm. Routine tasks are uncommonly fatiguing. At NO point did either of us have a fever. Get this: my wife—who is absolutely, certifiably healthy as a horse—has been dealing with a severe, fluke neurological disorder (that’s how we know she has otherwise flawless health; the battery of tests has been extensive, including MRIs, spinal, and an exhaustive bloodwork lab at Mayo). The neuro guy in town is almost impossible to get in to see, and when she called before a follow up to tell them that we both were fighting something off, they asked about the party-line symptoms (cough, fever, difficulty breathing) none of which we had, and told us to absolutely come in. We both passed the temperature screening at the front door with flying colors, and each got a little sticker on our sleeves allowing us into the office. Like a college kegger, or something.
On Sunday the 22nd, I started noticing mild shortness of breath. Disconcerting, but not at all severe. There was one night last week where I woke up around 2am, feeling like I just wasn’t getting full breaths. I sat in the front setting window for an hour, with some herbal tea and eerie silence outside, and did some zen breathing (.mil folks might call it "box breathing"), and eventually felt chill enough to go back to bed and sleep the sleep of the dead until 10-10:30. The days between Tues the 24th and Fri the 27th were the most epic fatigue/sleep days, but at no point did either of us ever break a fever, have GI trouble, start coughing, or have more than one watchlist symptom. My one symptom was the several days of feeling very mild shortness of breath—which my wife never got, and her one symptom was some mild nausea—which I never got. We ate whatever we wanted throughout.
Yesterday, I woke up feeling more or less normal, and didn’t peter out until after 10pm. Normal sleep (8.5 hours, maybe) last night was 8 hours, and I woke up stressing about work shit at 7:45 on the dot, pretty typical for my musician teaching schedule. As I type right now, I also feel—more or less—normal, like I just got over "something" during the weekend, only it lasted a lot longer. Of course, my wife is more active right now than she’s been all month. I know she’s GTG, because she’s done a pile of back laundry and is puttering about with typical enthusiasm.
One last data point; I’m about to turn 52, and my "fighting weight" is 164-166. No health issues besides marginal knees and bad eyes. I’ve got the cardio of a 28-year old, the humor of an 18-year old, and the retinas of an 88-year old.
When I got on the scale 2 days ago, I weighed 156.6. I’m pretty sure I haven’t weighed anything close to that since freshman year in HS. Wow.
Both my wife and I are (typically) 3-5 day a week gym people (weights/boxing) during summer and holiday break, and 2-3 day gym people during school (not optimal, but time constraints will be what they will be). We eat crazy healthy, non smoker... she doesn’t even drink (I hold that fort down for both of us).
In all, our experience seems to mirror yours, only stretched over a roughly 2x time frame.
The most disconcerting thing is being cleared by a doc office to come in for an appt, and do "essential’ things (get mail, bank checks, pick up groceries), with a heightened sense of hindsight that we now have. That can’t be good. I’ve also been in the LGS before the shortness of breath—my only posterboy symptom—came on. Of course, that place has been a madhouse; if I exposed them, it likely wasn’t the first or only.
Oh, and the #1 suspect is my wife’s 3xWeekly PT appointments in the main hospital complex, at the busiest PT center. They didn’t shut that down until after the 20th March. I suppose #2 could be the UPS store box where we get all our mail. Beyond that, there really isn’t any front runner for us picking this up.
At any rate, FWIW. My ID friend/former student/path center director told me that, of the 712 people on that seminal diamond cruise ship that tested positive for COVID-19, 344 of those positives were asymptomatic. That’s a ratio worth keeping in mind when it comes to estimating this thing. JMO.
@Nephrology, same ID doc tells me yesterday that the antibody test is absolutely coming, but it’s going to be a while before GJM or I, or our wives can take it. At this point, we don’t positively know what’s been eating at Mr & Mrs Gilbert Grapes, but we can make a reasonable guess.
And that’s the hand that’s been dealt to chez sidheshooter, as of Sun, 29 March.
Last edited by Totem Polar; 03-29-2020 at 04:40 PM.
”But in the end all of these ideas just manufacture new criminals when the problem isn't a lack of criminals.” -JRB
Squib308- How long have you had symptoms, and what were they?
"You win 100% of the fights you avoid. If you're not there when it happens, you don't lose." - William Aprill
"I've owned a guitar for 31 years and that sure hasn't made me a musician, let alone an expert. It's made me a guy who owns a guitar."- BBI
You're very welcome, Squib...goes without saying.
And I appreciate your perspective. I believe what you say makes a great deal of sense as far as what we face going forward.
There's nothing civil about this war.
Hang in there, Mr & Mrs Sidhe. I can't carry the ball here by myself. I demand you reverse course immediately.
There's nothing civil about this war.
For lack of better words, it’s refreshing to hear stories that aren’t worst-case, dreadful tales for a change. I’m glad you guys are fighting this off successfully.
The onset of allergy season and this off-and-on sore throat I’ve had since JAN are messing with my head. Literally and figuratively.
Honestly nothing I would consider significant if we weren’t already under the microscope (given my work). Last week I woke up in a cold sweat x1 but nothing crazy, just a little odd. Very mild nasal congestion. Wife had mild sore throat and headache. This is how it’s spread so damn fast...90 days to get around entire globe.
If I do much as pass unusual gas I will undergo testing. My point is that this is undoubtedly so much more widespread than people realize.
==
In terms of doing well, one cannot really make any judgement here until our Nasopharyngeal PCR is negative. At that point one can conclude recovery. Between now and then we do not know. We worked under suboptimal conditions. I have a 2 year old and 7 month old, which scares the snot out of me to think I might be leaving the,. However medical world or not, most of US will catch this anyway so it doesn’t really matter how it’s caught.
If more people would act like civil servants, stay home and do nothing, this shit would be over with in a week.
(Requisite former civil servant humor.)
Seriously though, let's get 'er done.
There's nothing civil about this war.
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