Or, phrases that I find triggering right now.
“Stop living in fear.”
Um, let me see, I’m still out here getting my groceries, volunteering at my local outdoor learning center two or three times a week, around other people, going for walks and shoveling snow (ick), getting my hair cut, going to doctors’ appointments, getting takeout…
We went on vacation — twice! — last year, to the Oregon Coast in August and to San Diego for Christmas. We tested several times, spent most of our time outside, and masked when we were around other people, but we were very much around other people.
Regardless of mandates, my modus operandi for the duration of the pandemic has been “when case counts are high, we shouldn’t be breathing on other people (because there is a lot of virus circulating in the community.)”
I wear masks when I’m around other people, even for a few minutes. I’ve received three doses of the Moderna vaccine. When rapid tests are available and I know I”m going to be traveling, I test before, after, and depending on the length of the trip and availability of tests, during. I do what I can to keep myself safe, and others safe from me.
I’m not eating in crowded restaurants (too many unmasked people in an enclosed space with unknown HVAC) or spending time in coffee shops (sob!), going to sporting events (yelling unmasked people). Missing these things suck rocks and I miss them, but right now our case counts are higher than they ever been and hospitalizations are ticking up…
… so we shouldn’t be breathing on other people.
That’s not fear. That’s pragmatism.
“You need to trust your immune system.”
Yeah, that’s going to be a solid “no.”
My immune system believes, with its whole being, that grass pollen is a legitimate reason to go to DefCon 1. (And some trees, ragweed in the East, and … tumbleweeds… ?) I did five years’ worth of immunotherapy because my seasonal allergies rendered me unable to perform my day-to-day activities without significant pharmaceutical intervention — year round — including antihistamines, eye drops, nasal sprays and inhalers.
Let’s not forget the secondary sinus infections, which are long lasting and painful.
And then there’s the fact that I have to take medication for the rest of my life because my immune system decided that the thyroid isn’t an essential organ. Granted (and thankfully), as far as autoimmune diseases go, this is one of the easier ones. But the weight gain, hair loss, dry skin and chronic constipation (now very well controlled, thankyouverymuch) aren’t really walks in the park.
In other words, my immune system is not known for making terrific decisions without significant instruction.
And then there’s this:
After my Covid booster, I had a robust immune response — probably a good thing, and not unexpected, but unpleasant — chills, fever, body aches, headache, and fatigue.
My asthmatic lungs encountered this set of conditions and swelled.
I do not have allergic asthma; it developed within a year of 9/11, when we were living in NYC. My triggers are cold/dry air, thermal inversions, smoke, and illness.
Your lungs can only expand so much before they hit your ribcage and start putting pressure your other organs. It makes breathing difficult, and it’s painful. Thankfully, the fever was short-lived and my medications helped allay most of the swelling within 36 hours. A week later, I did a short course of methylprednisolone to knock back the rest of the swelling. A month after that, I’m still coughing (thank you, cold/dry air) — it’s not worsening, it’s not dangerous (and not Covid — I tested multiple times with antigen tests in the two weeks after the booster and everything came back negative), but it’s not super fun.
If my lungs responded that way because of a vaccine response (not as a vaccine response, but rather a response to the vaccine response), I’m going to guess that they would have had a harder time with *actual* infection. That seems like a potential complication waiting to happen.
Right, so no, I do not trust my immune system. On its own, it’s not a reliable actor, and even when it acts in expected ways it can trigger other things.
If you want to trust your immune system to keep you safe during a global pandemic, you do you, but you might want to say a prayer that your immune system won’t be anything like mine, because that might not be a great experience for you.
“We need to learn to live with Covid.”
Yes, that’s absolutely true. We are in agreement on that point.
But I think this means something entirely different to you, the person who refuses to wear masks, or get vaccinated, and spends time in restaurants and at sporting events.
To me, learning to live with Covid means prioritizing our social situations and adjusting to accommodate those priorities. Schools and hospitals are of paramount importance; kids need to be in schools, and healthcare workers need to be able to do their jobs.
To me, this means that students, teachers and staff need to be able to be in schools safely. Not zero covid, but able to prevent major outbreaks. What’s required? The ability to identify — through rapid testing — who is most likely to be contagious and give them safe options for isolating. The ability to reign in spread when case counts are high, using masks, good ventilation and being outside (when possible). We’re doing these things where I am, though imperfectly.
And hospitals… we all bear responsibility for staying out of the hospital with dangerous Covid through vaccination, masking when around others, and testing, when necessary. This part is not hard.
I am not in favor of closures — and where there have to be closures, we as a society need to be ready to financially support businesses like restaurants and gyms so that we can go back to them when the threat recedes.
And, for the life of me, when people talk about closing schools — or trying to keep them open when they have major absence rates/high infections among teachers and staff (the school is not a safe environment if kids and teachers continually get sick) — but not bars/restaurants/arenas, it makes my blood boil.
Learning to live with Covid does not mean ignoring it and hoping it will go away. It means mitigating it with individual behavior *and* upgrading (or otherwise changing) systems that don’t work in the face of high infection rates. It’s not easy — or inexpensive — but it’s a way forward that acknowledges the challenges introduced by a highly contagious respiratory disease.
Good grief.
–*–*–
OK, so the folks who keep spouting these phrases can keep on keeping on — I have no say over what anyone says (or believes) and that is the way it should be — but every time I hear them, the little bubble over my head says “Bitch, please.”
Carmen Yount 