#i am feeling unwell for many reasons these days. it is bad enough that ive considered trying to learn how to drive

[readymades2002]

having a bad enough time that i am looking at what performances are scheduled for the ballet+opera near me and fantasizing about going on my own and having a nice time. which is maybe a normal thing for people with jobs to do but as i am a shut-in who has trained myself to stop having earthly material desires like tickets to performing arts things or any say over what my life looks like whatsoever is a dire sign

[idio-cies]

Tine and Anxiety

How are people feeling? Knowing that tomorrow is the last episode of this beautiful series? Sad? Excited? Don’t want it to be over? Same

Welp, this may or may not hurt when reading and probably won’t be my last meta/analysis on this series. Anyways... This is a long post folks, so make sure you are sitting comfortably.

I am almost certain that Tine accentuates some kind of anxiety.

I don’t like diagnosing people, but this is just something that I deeply relate Tine with. As a person who has CFS/ME with depression and anxiety, who also has a best friend with severe anxiety, my mum and sister also having depression as well as having many other friends with mental health issues revolving around anxiety and/or depression and doing a lot research both on anxiety and depression. I know the ins and outs of these mental illnesses. I will not go into further detail because as I am trying by hardest to not sound like an obnoxious twat whilst writing this.

I came across this article so I could check that I was right about relationship anxiety which Tine does express. This is pretty self-explanatory so you can read at your own leisure if you wish, but as a brief summary relationship anxiety most likely comes out of previous bad relationships, low self-esteem an attachemnt style one has grown up with in childhood (honestly this is another thing entirely, I talk a little bit about this here), but also relies on knowing oneself, having good communication etc.It just screams out here.

I need to clear things up as well before I really start getting in deep. It is correct that every human being has self-doubt, it is intrinsic to the human psyche, there is no doubt about it, unless you are self-righteous or have learnt that you are loved and you can love yourself a healthy amount, then good for you! This video is a good summary of how disliking oneself is natural human response

Now, where anxiety related to Tine comes in is the fact that he ruminates, he worries excessively and his automatic response to things going wrong he places on himself, and just in general has such a deep lack of self-worth and self-love that all you wanna do is cuddle him all day. This takes it further than what a normal human beings response is. 

Tine obsesses, and as a result makes him spiral and becomes unwell. Rumination is both a feature of Anxiety and depression. This is where things get tricky because Depression and Anxiety work hand in hand, with some traits crossing over (such as rumination), you can also have panic attacks with depression as well. The reason why I think it is anxiety is because of how things morphed with Tine, how he worried himself to be literally sick on more than one occasion

and it looks like he does the same this week. You can see the IV and how he is laying 

and he doesn’t to eat

This is not “normal human behaviour”. Worrying so much it makes you ill is one thing (see article here), but actively avoiding food is another thing. It’s another response people have when they are under extreme stress, though people can also over eat.

My analysis of “Escape” supports rumination.

There is no category that I will place him. I will leave this article here for people to go through if they are interested (I’m sorry, I know this is a lot of links, I just want to prove what I’m saying). 

so, when we meet Tine he seems like this ball of energy, he comes across as self-righteous with his Mr Chic facade

But that’s the thing: it’s a facade, it’s a coping mechanism, which shields him. I wouldn’t say that this is a classic example of anxiety as anyone can put up a front to hide all sorts of things. I know that I used to have facades or personalities I use in front of people.

Anyway, this Mr. Chic persona was all that, a persona, he took refuge in it. Which is why we see the comeback of it in ep 9 as he was experiencing some stage fright mixed with a heck of a lot of self-doubt and stress, which Green had identified was a coping mechanism!!!!

This front was used in order to block himself from being hurt, from rejection and from life in general, as well as of course criticism. His friends aren’t the brightest bunch, though evidently Fong (bless his heart) is very emotionally intelligent and let us know that they were aware of Tine and how he self-imposes on himself, has to prove his worth etc

This explains why he was so fatalistic in ep 11

Because he is still putting himself on trial and their relationship

It was legit after the tree got trodden on it all went wrong 

Poor Nuisance Tree... RIP

Anyway, but as friends do, they tease each other, which is ultimately something that Tine is afraid of. He doesn’t like the teasing. Based on my perspective of teasing, I bite back with teasing, but it may be because it’s because I am sensitive about it. Tine by no means has my temper, so it doesn’t surprise me if he is effected and is scared to be teased because in all actuality, he is sensitive about those topics. 

Next, he gets obsessed. People noticed about not moving on from Sarawat, there are a few explanations. 1. they needed it for Sarawat’s popularity to broadcast it 2. I bet you Tine got intrigued 3. potentially, he got obsessed with the idea. Tine was adamant to “get rid of Green” this in of itself was an obsession and no fucking wonder it backfired. Some, “normal, healthy” people I’m sure would’ve moved on, but oh no, not this dumbass quartet

Which is another thing. He is heavily influenced by his friends. Naturally, a person listen and adapt their thinking to their peers, but some don’t and are adamant in their thoughts. What gets me here is that Tine practically doesn’t allow himself to think for himself very much. I mean, it’s natural to go to friends for advice, but he was always very quick to go “yeah you’re right”. He is too easily swayed by what his friends tell him or their philosophies. Go look at episode 8 1/4 6:50 onwards. He concludes so quickly... Though I guess in this round, he felt it was right.

As soon as he sees one “fit” per se, that is it, which is apt as he is always been on the search for “the one”

(It will not surprise me if this series does full circle, and has Tine going to Sarawat once more as Sarawat did all of the chasing after this... kinda)

Tine can make up his mind very quickly once he sees fit. The only time he has really made sense and not listened to his friends fully was when he realised he loved Sarawat, and he went hell for leather on proving himself in episode 9. 

Tine had to prove himself in order to be worthy of Sarawat to love him, he thought he had failed, but Sarawat showed him a different perspective. Sarawat is very good at comforting Tine and showing him a new perspective... 

Sarawat is so good in this scene, because he tells Tine (in their little hypothetical language) that it is up to Tine is in control (which he felt he wasn’t), that Sarawat won’t pressure him, and that he is enough just as he is. That he doesn’t need to prove himself.

To a degree he helps every time, but as I have said before, if Tine is anything like me, those affirmations are useless after a couple hours max.

This post and also this one are really good at explaining Sarawat, and my perception of the last episode, so please also give those a read because I don’t want to repeat and make this even longer than it is! I do not blame Sarawat, and understand that it is human to make mistakes, which is also why I am making this post, because Tine is also wrong and is not helping their relationship or himself!!!

The time when he did believe in them was during episode 10 with Type in the house... it was extraordinary

Sorry I love Sarawat’s reaction to this

It’s like “Okay, you got it, why you gotta be so cute tho” 

Then the next week it goes downhill again and he believes that he is the one causing everything to go wrong (ahem, look at the first article)

He puts all the blame on himself... But Sarawat was always there to tell him that it was okay, that he was there with him, never got angry, just gave him smiles and headpats galore while looking at him with all the love in the world

I had to add in the “lets go to bed” bit here 

because I feel like it’s under appreciated. Sarawat was continuously telling Tine “we can look for it later, lets focus on this for now” and did a little nod. He was trying to help Tine not feel so bad, he recognised it and tried to give him comfort. He tried setting an agenda, so that Tine didn’t need to be overwhelmed with processing too many things if that makes any sense? He cares a lot and knew it was bothering him. It didn’t work as Tine was riddled with guilt, so he wasn’t satiated by it unfortunately, but this trip really did churn everything up :/ 

It’s just super hard to get Tine to feel alright in himself, but Sarawat is so lovely about it all. He loves Tine so much, so this week is going to hurt so bad when Tine tries to break things off as it is just going to be so difficult to make sure Tine is secure in himself and the relationship... I better stop

The fact that this is the state Tine puts himself in, again and again screams anxiety to me. The facade kept things up for a while, but I would not be surprised if this is how he went through life for quite some time. Plus the fact that Type also shows this need for a facade by trying to be a perfectionist is very interesting as well. 

Of course, I can be wrong in all of this. Please don’t hold me to it, but as a person who profoundly resonates with Tine, and would consider myself to be well versed in anxiety, I think that Tine most likely does have a form of anxiety. He just takes “self-doubt” to the next level. 

As always I am welcome to discussion! Credits to those blogs with the posts I linked to! 

Thank you for reading, I hope you guys are all staying safe, and I look forward to tomorrows episode ^-^ 

I am so not ready to let it go 😭😭

[stephenremedios]

My experiments with Covid-19

Day 1 - 23rd September 2020:

Consistent with my morning routine, I returned from a game of tennis to discover that Dylan was feeling tired and fatigued after his morning soccer game with other kids in the community. He washed up and sat through his online classes. It was the third day of his first cumulative assessment. The boys had all begun their first term examination on Monday. It was a new experience for them, but they seemed to enjoy the new format much better! Aidan was of the view that the questions made him think more and write less. By lunch Dylan was spent. He went to sleep and woke up in time for dinner.

We all sleep in the same room, with Dylan at one corner and me on the other side. Aidan, Ethan and then Ray. I ended up giving his aching limbs a short massage as he struggled to go to sleep. He tossed and turned for a bit, but finally fatigue took over. Ray suggested I take his temperature. It was 98.1F

Day 2- 24th September 2020:

Dylan woke up feeling normal the next morning. We historically associate these bouts of fatigue and fever with a growth spurt. Dylan stood next to our Thomas height scale and I measured his height – he had grown 2 cm since the last time we had taken a reading, two months ago.

Known for being the paranoid person in the house, I insisted the boys take a break from soccer as a matter of abundant caution. I had a tennis date at 6:30 that I regretted – I was feeling fine, but I decided to play it safe. 

It was this same paranoia that had me list all the potential sources of infection when the pandemic first emerged. After looking at our lifestyle we decided to do away with a driver and a maid. We retained a gardener with the caveat that no one would work with him in the garden at the same time. We switched to shopping online to minimize exposure to many people in a mall or supermarket. 

These measures had been effective over the last six months so there was no reason to think we had contracted the dreaded Covid-19.

At about 6:00 in the evening I started to feel itchy at the back of my throat. I hadn’t had a cold or cough in over 7 months. Raynah suggested I do a Betadine gargle before I went to sleep that night, which I did. 

Day 3 - 25th September 2020:

I woke up with a high fever, intense body pain and a sense of having no energy whatsoever. It was a new feeling; unlike anything I had experienced before. It was like I had gone from a 100% to 5% in 24 hours. I woke up well past my usual wake time of 6:00 AM. The boys told me that their normal morning visit to Villa #10 to visit my mother and play with the kittens hadn’t fructified because she wasn’t answering the doorbell.

I proceeded to Villa #10 to see why she wasn’t answering the bell. Like the boys had reported, she wasn’t responding to the bell or to my calls to her window right below the garage. Spotty, the mother of the three kittens was pacing up and down the entrance of the house while the hungry kittens were scaling the curtains in desperation on the inside of the house. Clearly something was amiss. 

I used the duplicate key we have to the house to let myself in. Spot edged into the house before I could retrieve the key from the door. The kittens mobbed her desperate for their early morning feed. I made my way up to the bedroom.

Opening the door, I found my mother looking like she had been on an IV drip for the last week. She had a bad night too. We proceeded to exchange notes on our symptoms. We were both in awe of the speed of the onset and the extent of debilitation in such a short while. We agreed it was a bad flu.

We resolved that the best way to fight it would be to sleep as much as possible, to allow the body to recover from this nasty bug. Aidan meanwhile complained of a mild cough but didn’t have any fever or any other symptoms. Dylan rebounded like he always does and asked if he could go and hit against the wall in the tennis court for a while. He settled for a game of indoor squash with Ethan instead. I slept 13.4 hours of the 20 hours I spent in bed that day.

Day 4 - 26th September 2020:

A much better night after two torrid nights. I had begun a course of antibiotics the previous night and my cough was on the mend. I woke up feeling much better. The tennis gang was starting a little later today given the overnight rainfall had rendered the courts unplayable at our usual 6:30 AM start time. 

A notification on my phone asked “Are you good to play @8:00”. While I fancied a few sets of low intensity doubles I decided to play it safe again. The conversation ended with advice to do steam inhalation to overcome the cough. 

Raynah woke up later than usual, with a slight fever and body ache. She didn’t have a cough though. She pushed through the fatigue rustling up a special weekend meal. I could smell the aroma of the meal from the bedroom as she rustled it up in the kitchen. I reassured myself that it wasn’t Covid-19. After all I hadn’t lost my sense of smell.

The boys do athletics and fitness classes on the weekends. Raynah and I decided it made sense to keep them back from classes. We deliberated on whether to send Aidan and Ethan since only Dylan had been ill on Wednesday. We decided it wasn’t worth the taking the risk no matter how insignificant it seemed at the time.

Day 5 - 27th September 2020:

I had a restless night, struggling to find any periods of deep sleep. My body was still fighting the infection and I was convinced that this was a strain of flu that I hadn’t experienced before. Ray continued feeling a little unwell so I let her sleep an hour longer and fixed the boys cereal for breakfast.

Later in the day we all came together to record a short concert for my sister’s son, Neil in the US. We had forgotten to call on the 26th (his birthday). We usually all jump on a call and sing LIVE! This time we would have to settle for a recorded message.

All in all it was an eventless day and it seemed like everyone on was on the path to make a quick recovery from the flu. If Dylan had indeed been the one that brought it in, then surely we should make a speedy recovery just like he did. 

Day 6 - 28th September 2020:

With the antibiotic kicking in, my throat was on the mend. It felt like my energy levels were inching back up. The fever was on a downward trajectory. The worst was behind us. Raynah continued to have mild flu symptoms and my mother hadn’t shown any signs of a fever the previous night. She had recovered sufficiently to make food for the ‘patients in #145’ she joked. Her main movements over the next 48 hours would be to deliver food to us since both Ray and I continued to be under the weather. Ray began to experience breathlessness when she climbed the steps that evening. I was concerned but concluded it was probably just the fatigue of having cleaned the whole house that day. The larger picture suggested that we were all progressing in the right direction.

We would have gone to sleep that night without having considered for a moment that we might be Covid +ve. 

We are early sleepers. Lights go out by 9:00 and everyone is usually asleep by 9:30 after some bedtime banter. A little past 8:45 PM Ray read out an email from the Ozone Kovid Kare team – The live-in help at one of the houses of the boys who play soccer with Aidan and Dylan had tested +ve for Covid (It is a separate matter that he turned out to be a false positive when he was re-tested!). 

In that moment, the odds of us having contracted Covid increased from 0% to 1% in my mind. It was now possible that the boy got it from his house help, Dylan got it from the boy, that my mom and I got it from Dylan and then the rest of the family got it too! (It is a separate matter that Aidan, Dylan, Ethan and all the boys and their families tested negative and we still haven’t figured out where we picked the virus up from).

It was playing out like the closing sequence of the movie Contagion in my mind! Dylan picking up the virus as he rubbed his nose after touching the ball while playing soccer. My mom inhaling the virus as Dylan recited a poem later that evening while he was doing his studies with her. Ray interrupted my rampant imagination. “What should be do now?” she asked.

Given that there was now a 1% chance that we might have Covid, Ray and I decided that we should get tested. We were still sure that it was just a flu since the only person still feeling a little ill at that time was me. I’m intrinsically risk averse, and most of my reading suggested that people were dying when they were taken to hospitals too late in their fight with the virus. To save time it made sense to get tested along with the boy’s family.

After a few late-night calls and assistance from the very resourceful Ozone Kovid Kare Team we were all set to get tested the next day along with the family whose domestic help had tested positive.

Day 7 - 29th September 2020:

Our hall room has furniture on the sides with a wide-open space in the middle. The boys have spent hours during the lockdown hitting shuttles and table tennis balls against this wall. A broken light fitting that we decided not to replace after it was repeatedly broken by the boys tells the story of many hours of fierce combat with the wall. The wall also doubles up as a green screen for Aidan’s live streams and as a film screen when we run home movies.

When the lab technician arrived in full PPE to do the tests, our hall room looked more like a operation theatre than the usual improvised squash court it normally is. Today that expansive wall framed a single chair under the lights in the center of the room. We took turns to sit down on this chair while the technician first sent a swab up our nostrils and then down our throats. The technician did a thorough job, swabbing both nostrils till tears were streaming down my eyes. For the throat probe, he went deep enough to stimulate an involuntary cramp in my neck. If you experience discomfort during the swab collection, chances are that it is being done effectively. The technician told us that it takes 24-48 hours to get the results and that we should expect a call any time after 4:00 PM on the following day.

The boys meanwhile recorded the proceedings on their iPads with great excitement, unable to comprehend the gravity of the situation. They demanded to be tested as well fearing that they were missing out on this once-in-al-lifetime adventure.

My sister in Oregon, US had been anxious. Her husband was up late and received the pictures of the testing event. He assured her that all was well and that we would have the results the next day.

My mother and Ray looked to already be on a recovery path. The boys were fighting with us to allow then to resume their normal morning soccer routine. We asked that they be patient and hold on for one more day. The results would be here tomorrow, and they could return to their normal routine.

As we went to bed that night, I apologized to Ray for not having done anything for her birthday! I joked that a -ve Covid test certificate might be the most original, unique, quirky and memorable birthday present she would every receive.

Day 8 - 30th September 2020

I had an unusually high fever the previous night and felt lethargic and was exhausted when I woke up. Despite multiple doses of paracetamol my temperature had hovered between 102F & 103F without any signs of going down. My resting heart rate had also jumped from a normal 56 bpm to 69 bpm. My body was still fighting this virus. My mom walked over in the morning to deliver a cake for Ray and to drop a card in the mailbox. We were keen that that we cut it in the morning and start the day on a positive note. 

Ray received a call from the laboratory at about 11:00 AM. He was very apologetic as he informed her that all three of us had tested positive, while the entire family of person who had initially tested positive were all negative! 

It took about a minute for the information to sink in. 

We were all Covid +ve. 

My first reaction was to suggest that we all get tested again… this couldn’t possibly be true. After all, the house help had gone from being +ve to -ve in 24 hours. It might well be the same with us.

We hadn’t discussed the plan in the event of testing positive, so the first big decision was to figure out how to get my mom to our house given we now knew she was positive. Would we have to get an ambulance? 

In the hour after the call to confirm our infection a variety of worst-case scenarios flashed through my head. I am wired like that. My mother and wife would be taken in an ambulance to a woman specific Covid Care Center. The boys and I would be whisked off to a gent only center. Our phones would be taken away. 

Given the shortage of beds in general, how would they have 6 beds if all of us took ill? How was it all that four of us were symptomatic and I had moderate to severe symptoms when most people seem to have been asymptomatic? From all the metrics that I was tracking I knew there was something wreaking havoc on my vitals. Was I going to be admitted? Was I going to need oxygen? Was I going to end up on a ventilator? Was I going to die?

My mother meanwhile decided she wanted to quarantine by herself. She is an iron willed woman and I wasn’t in any shape to have a disagreement with her. It was particularly difficult for me to have her spend the next 14 days in isolation because she was at the receiving end of an acrimonious accusation relating to the cake she delivered for Ray’s birthday that morning. I absolved myself of the guilt I was experiencing at not being able to be there for my mom and got on with more pressing matters.

I reined my thoughts in and determined that this crisis called for some affirmative action. With tremendous help from my assistant Freeda, we were signed up for a home care Covid Care package within 4 hours of our positive result being known to us. At 5:30 that evening we received all our medication along with a digital thermometer and Oximeter neatly packed in a box.

The magnitude of the disease stuck me when I opened the box and saw the number of pills within it. I have never ingested so many pills in a single sitting ever. We all began our course of anti-viral medication that evening. I struggled to sleep that night. It was a combination of fear and a difficulty with my breathing that kept me awake and restless. I discovered the next morning that my fever had been well over 101F for most of the night.

Day 9 - 1st October 2020

While Ray and my mom seemed to be making good progress, my downward spiral continued. The chills had returned, and I spent most of the day covered from head to toe in bed. I had read that sleeping in the prone position helps the lungs in the fight and recovery, so I began to experiment with that. From time to time, the pulse Oximeter would show an initial reading of 93 and 94 before deep breathing would bring it to a more acceptable 95 or 96. I would feel breathless after climbing the dozen steps to get to our bedroom.

My temperature remained high through the day hovering between 103 F and 104 F. I decided it might be a good idea to speak with another doctor.

The first thing that the doctor did after a barrage of questions and giving me a patient hearing was to assure me that I was not going to die! He said that he had seen over 2000 cases in his ward, and that there was no need to be alarmed. It seemed like a silly thing, but the conviction in his voice when he said it made me hopeful and positive. 

The second thing he told me was that all the current medication I was taking was 'candy’, and that none of it had cleared clinical trials. The medication was essentially in his reckoning, a placebo. It wouldn’t do any harm. It wouldn’t help either. He told me to continue my course of anti-biotics and use paracetamol to manage the fever.

That conversation left me hopeful and distraught at the same time. How could I be taking so many pills when there was no evidence to conclusively say they worked? We resolved to continue our medication and see how our bodies responded. 

Antivirals are dosed in an interesting way as I discovered. The first two doses are monster doses (1800 mg) and then it drops to smaller doses (400 mg). It does not help that these tablets are manufactured in 200 mg shots. It is quite daunting when you have to put down 9 of them! By 10:00 PM that night I had 4000 mg of the anti-viral in me and I wasn’t feeling any better. I was starting to feel worse.

Earlier in the day, Shanthi, a doctor resident in our Community offered her research and findings as an alternate way to combat and inhibit the progress of the disease. She referenced the work of Dr. Paul Marik and suggested that we add a few common medications that had proven effective in helping fight the virus in some trials. She cautioned of course that these weren’t 100% proven but reduced the odds of fatalities.

From where I was both physically and psychologically, I would have taken any medication that reduced the odds of my death by as little as 1%. We went all in. I was now on three prescriptions desperately hoping that one would work and that I would start to get better.

Within minutes of us confirming that we would go with Dr. Shanti’s line of treatment, her husband Pravin dropped off all the medication for the three of us in neatly labelled Ziploc pouches. We promptly took our first doses before going to bed that night.

That night was the toughest night. My body wasn’t feeling good at all. I had now lost a sense of smell and taste completely. Repeated bouts of coughing incessantly made me feel like throwing up all the time. I had no appetite. I had lost 4 kgs in the week since I first felt an itch at the back of my throat. I struggled to sleep in a prone position since it isn’t how I normally sleep. I considered what I might pack if my Oxidation dropped and I needed to get admitted the next day. I had carried an Oximeter to bed that night. I wanted to stay on top of my oxidation levels should they drop suddenly. 

I had read enough about a condition that afflicts some Covid patients called ‘happy hypoxia’ and it had scared me sufficiently to make me even more paranoid. I took my Oxidation over a dozen times through the night. On a couple of occasions, it began at 93, but with deep breathing in a prone position rose to 97 within the minute. I didn’t sleep much that night.

Day 10 – 2nd October 2020

I woke up feeling fatigued. I hadn’t slept much; my fever had been high, and my cough continued. The cough was particularly severe when I woke up and I would have these bouts where I would cough incessantly for 2-3 minutes. It felt like there was a significant amount of phlegm at the bottom of my throat, but the cough was a dry one. I also began to notice that I would feel breathless when I spoke a couple of sentences at a time. Raynah and my mother had stopped logging a temperature and their oxidation levels had been healthy throughout. It was particularly frustrating that the virus had singled me out for this special treatment.

 I remember counting the pills I took that morning. I had 6 before breakfast and 12 after. I was throwing the proverbial kitchen sink at the problem. After downing all of them, I returned to the bed to try and sleep. I forgot to have my paracetamol that morning. The BBMP came to test the boys that morning.

I woke up at about 2:00 in the afternoon sweating profusely. My head was dripping with perspiration like it might after a lung busting rally on the tennis court on a summer morning. I hadn’t taken medication and my fever had broken. Surely that must be a good sign.

At 4:00 that evening I received a call from the hospital. I expected it was our usual doctor checking on my progress. It was a psychologist. I have never spoken to a psychologist in my life up to this point so I am not quite sure what to expect. From everything I have seen in the movies, I expect to do most of the talking.

Her first question explores my anxiety levels. I tell her that I am extremely anxious given that all six of us contracted the virus and I was the only one who got a knock out punch. 

Her next set of questions explore my history of stress and hypertension. I assure that I don’t have any such conditions despite a family history of these ailments.

She offers me medication to handle my nightly ruminations as an SOS if I am unable to sleep. I am also advised to wear a rubber band around my wrist which I am to pull and release every time I notice I’m having negative thoughts.

I slept for the rest of the day and my fever dropped from its previous highs. I had recovered enough by the evening to enjoy a cup of tomato soup without fearing that I would throw it up.

Day 11 & 12 – October 3rd and 4th

Two very similar days. It felt like things were in the balance and could go either way. 

The boys test results came in, and miraculously all three tested negative. A large number of people in the community including all our primary and secondary contacts tested negative as well. I didn’t know what to make of this. From everything that I had read, it was well past 10 days since the boys first got infected. Given they were asymptomatic with the exception of Dylan’s one day sickness they were probably virus free by the time we tested them. That’s the only plausible explanation for their negative tests.

None of us wake up hoping to spread a virus. 

As a family we heaved a collective sigh of relief that we hadn’t inadvertently infected anyone else in the community. Looking back we are glad that we erred on the side of caution.

My fever continued to hover between 100F & 101F. I was measuring my blood oxidation almost every hour to stay on top of any potential drop. I had begun to take melatonin but that wasn’t helping me sleep any better. My respiratory rate had been closer to 19 per minute, above my normal 17 per minute rate in the run up to the sickness.

The cough continued though I was now regaining my sense of small and taste. My appetite also began to return in a big way and I had a hearty meal after a long time. It wasn’t that the food wasn’t tasty over the previous week, I just couldn’t get myself to eat more than the bare minimum to be able to take all my medication.

Day 13 to 18 – October 5th to October 12th

What a tremendous relief it was to wake up without a fever finally. I concluded that the body had fought the virus successfully. That closed one potentially dangerous chapter and opened another equally threatening one – would a cytokine storm follow? An excessive immune response can also do damage to your body in several ways. While the cytokine storm begins in the lungs it can quickly spread to other parts of the body leading to a variety of complications.

This period was also filled with anxiety waiting to see if there was any googly along the recovery path. While the fever was gone, the residual dry cough was now being treated with a steroid. The doctor’s view was that the lungs would take between 3 to 6 months to repair the damage the virus had done. I would have to do an X Ray a month later to make sure that the repair was headed in the right direction.

As a matter of abundant precaution, I continue to track my blood oxidation every few hours. I know for certain that I’m no longer Covid +ve, but I’m not out of the woods yet. A statin and a blood thinner will hopefully cut the risk of a heart attack and a stroke (both run in the family!). A battery of other supplements like Zinc, Vitamin C & D etc. will reduce the internal inflammation and help the body recover faster. The path back from this disease is a slow one and I’m learning to be patient with myself. In a strange way, I am more aware of every breath that I take.

Day 19 - Today 13th October 2020

I still haven’t accepted that the risk level we signed up for resulted in the whole family getting infected. Worse still, the failure to identify the source and the limited immunity that you have even after contracting it means that we live in fear of the family getting it again. Looking back, I ask myself what I would have done differently!

1.     We should have gotten tested earlier: It helped that we quarantined as a family as soon as Dylan experienced tiredness for a day, but we all should have gotten tested earlier. The assumption that our limited contact with the external world made it impossible for us to contract Covid was a wrong one. If anyone in the family gets a fever or cough going forward, we will test at once.

2.     We should have prepared better from a knowledge perspective: Raynah did a great job preparing for Covid. We have had the sanitizers, household disinfectants, plastic gloves, disposable masks etc. for over 6 months before we got sick. We weren’t prepared however with the right knowledge. It is very disorienting to get different directions from well-intentioned doctors and choose a course of action when you can’t look after yourself! We were very fortunate to have Shanti share literally the latest research (published on the 28th of September!)  in the US with us. We will have a small Covid medication kit at home updated for the latest clinical trials going forward.

3. We should have had a plan in the event of testing positive: I was in denial even after the test results came in. I still spend a lot of my waking time retracing everyone’s movements in the run up to the first instance of fatigue in the family. Thinking through what you will do should you test positive is easier when you aren’t positive. We have a plan of action should anyone test positive again in the family.

We are grateful that we didn’t infect anyone, and that the limited set of people we had contact with all tested negative as part of the contact tracing protocol. Without knowing for sure who got infected first and where the infection came from, there is no way of knowing anything for certain.

Having been through this ordeal, what advice would I offer you? 

Take this virus very seriously. For many it might pass without them even realizing that had it. For a few however it can literally mean a life and death situation in a matter of a week if you ignore it. Take all the precautions you can. I saw this Swiss Cheese analogy on the internet from Dr. Ian M Mackay that made a lot of sense to me. We took all the precautions but the virus still reached our respiratory tract!

As I lay awake one night struggling to breathe, coming to terms with the new prone sleeping position I asked myself what kind of gambler I might be if I was gambling with my life.

If someone gave me the chance to roll a wheel with a 2% chance of dying, would I take it?

 The answer is a resounding ‘No’!

 If there’s one piece of advice that you take away from reading this piece let it be this – go to great lengths to protect yourself and your family from this virus. The only thing you have any control over is the risk level you expose yourself to. Once you contract the virus you are pretty much at the mercy of the virus and no one can predict what happens next. It is entirely a matter of chance!

It can pass without you even noticing you had it. Ask Aidan and Ethan. 

It can knock you out for a few hours. Ask Dylan. 

It can be no more severe than a common flu. Ask Ray and my mom. 

It can leave you breathless, with damaged lungs and a residual pneumonia. Ask me. 

It can kill you. Ask anyone who has lost a friend or loved one to the disease.

The science is still approximate with new cocktails and regimes of medication being added to clinical trials every day across the world. Do everything you can to minimize the odds of getting the virus, cut every possible surplus contact. Mask up and maintain physical distancing.

[saudade-asylum]

rant time

im so mentally unwell. i keep crying and then just stopping, i dont even get the satisfaction of a proper sob. i had a breakdown on christmas eve and hid in the pantry and just started giggling and when my mum asked why i said i did it because ‘emillie couldnt find me there’ why do i feel the need to hide from myself you ask??? because im a humongous arsehole. I drove all my friends away, this year has been horrible, my childhood best friend committed suicide and the other one cut me off, i put all these expectations on myself for my foundation in art and i didnt meet them, i lost all of my friends because i couldnt handle a conversation and lashed out, tried to make up for it, and then lashed out again when things didnt go my way. I spent all summer in therapy whilst also working at a call centre for ppi and i think the only reason i did so well was because i wanted to hear people on the phone get mad at me and insult me and yell at me because my ex friends were all ignoring me and id rather have hatred and disappointment than nothing. I dont think im actually asexual because i think ive just been repressing my actual personality because no one ever seems to actually like me so i keep faking interests and i dont know what i actually like to do, if its an interest i developed on my own or if i subconciously developed it to fit in with people? i hate myself so fucking much, im ugly im fat and so i do dye my hair to seem cool and courageous and interesting but really im just some fat bitch with a mile long mean streak and i just have all this repressed anger and its coming out man oh fuck is it coming out.. the other day i had my earphones setting set so the audio only came out of one earbud and when i tried to fix it the screen was being weird and wouldnt let me and i got so frustrated i started crying and scratching my arm to buggary, i wanted to rip out my eyes and eat my own tongue. im all alone in my flat and i hate it because i feel like i have no one to talk to and i mean im pretty sure all my flat mates hate me anyway (they decided to do christmas gifts without me woo) and i have friends at uni but theyre going through a really hard time themselves (dead relatives, cheating on boyfriends, and other boy/girl troubles) and i dont want to dump more things on them and even if i did how does my shit compare to that? i have to go home in a few days and fuck i really dont want to. im gonna get those judgy looks and the familys a fucking joke - no one likes eachother and im tired of all the fucking secrets and lies. whos great uncle billy? why have i never met him? what did my gran do to piss him off so much? is my mum actually the racist my gran makes her out to be? what did my gran do to my mum? whats the actual reason shes been kicked out of the will? and why am i in the middle of it all. i i just dont want to exist, i dont want to die but i dont want to live. i just want to go into a box for a week and just breakdown, pull out all my teeth shave my head rip off my nails and stab myself in the face but come out completely fine and sane and ready to get back to uni. i cant sleep i dont want to eat but then i binge and i just want to vomit all my organs up and then sleep for three thousand years. im done man, im so fucking done. every year its ‘this is my year’ and it never is. im not even the most important person in my life id rather die than let anyone know how i actually am because theyve all got enough going on and i dont want to have another year of disappointment of friends deciding that im the weak link in the group and cutting me out. i must be so fuckign toxic cause theres only so many times you can convince yourself that youre not the problem and youve just met bad people and boy have i got a long line of people who would love to see me dead or hurt, i just want it all to end  i cant go on like this. i keep spending money i dont have and setting challenges for myself things to do so i wont off myself or walk into the woods and just never come back. this cycle in my head is killing me the i want to die but i cant but i want to cycle is rotting my brain from the inside out and its been such a long process that killing myself has become my coping mechanism. ive normalised my own pain for so long that its gotten to the point that this is just who i am. if i got rid of it or tried to get some help i dont even know who id be and im scared that shes worse than what i am now and id honestly rather off myself than prove everyone who ever hated me right

[whatamitochondriac-blog]

Facebook August 11, 2017 - This is a difficult update to make. I've been waiting until I had a few remaining pieces of information but I have enough to let you know what is going on. 

 As you know, I was diagnosed with toxic mold exposure and I am in Tampa at a facility that specializes in treating mold toxicity. The fact that there is a facility that has successfully treated hundreds of thousands of people is something I'm extremely grateful for. 

 You've seen pictures of the port through which I will get my treatment every day. Most likely beginning on Monday. All of this is good, and it's the positive I am clinging to right now. 

 The rest of the news is not unscary. I am sharing this without much censorship because I'm feeling afraid and even though I have a lot of love in my life, this is in many ways a solitary process and I want to feel a little less alone as I begin it.  

This stuff won't be super easy to hear for those who love me very much - much less easy to say - and I'm sorry if it freaks anyone out... but here it is in all it's glory. These toxins, called mycotoxins (from mold exposure), that I am infected with, are extremely poisonous, because of what they do. This is what I have been learning about in excruciating detail. 

1) They compromise the liver's ability to produce the enzymes needed for detoxification required to keep the body healthy. 2) They compromise the body and brain's immune systems. 3.) They destroy the blood brain barrier and gut lining. 4.) The destruction they cause allows parasites and bacteria into the blood, brain and nervous system cells; all of these organisms and toxins produce toxic matter while they simultaneously destroy healthy tissue and organs. I'll let that one sink in for a moment. :( 

5) As this is occurring and the body is preoccupied with trying to keep itself running, the nervous system is inevitably exposed to additional environmental toxins (e.g., petrochemicals in the air and water which cause neurodegeneration, cancers, etc). And here is where it gets sad and scary. 6) As a result of all this toxicity and invasive organisms, cell walls are destroyed, premature death of vital cells happens with increasing speed and regularity, and mitochondrial function is totally compromised. (Mitochondria are essential to life, and mitochondrial dysfunction is responsible for many diseases you know the names of. Multiple sclerosis is one example.) 

This chain reaction has happened because I am genetically unable to create immunity to mold. So this destructive chain of events has likely been underway a long time. There was standing water in our basement that we used to roller skate around. Many of our basements were musty as were my friends. And I lived in plenty of water damaged buildings and apartments. When Mom's basement flooded I was sitting amongst the mold growing on the walls and on our ruined photo albums for hours at a time for months, including after the mold was remediated (killed) which meant I was just marinating in mycotoxins. Many people have asked me why this is just now happening but it hasn't - it's been slowly creeping up. 

 Most people who have known me in the past 10 years have known me as a person with health problems. Panic attacks, increasing body pain and weakness, cognitive changes and sensitivity/electrical activity in my brain that no doctor could diagnose - until I found one trained in environmental medicine (which is not taught in medical school, apparently). The past year I have been unwell quite a lot, and in the past couple months have lost a lot of function as a result of this electrical activity in my nervous system. 

 I learned this week that this electrical activity is caused by biofilm which these many foreign organisms create and live in, inside the fatty tissues of the body - most importantly in the brain. This biofilm becomes an ecosystem, complete with communication from organism to organism, and functions with a lot of electrical activity independent of the brain's function and in response to the brain's function. 

This is a photo of my brain - my precious and only brain - which is so electrified that even in a sleeping state it is never turned off. All that red and orange and yellow is activity - activity that should not be there in a resting state (which is the state in which the PET scan is taken - which required quite a lot of drugs to achieve just like sleep does for me, now, every night). The lower portion, from my understanding, is tissue, and anything not black is non-brain matter. So all that blue stuff is parasites and bacteria and mycotoxins and petrochemicals. :( I learned this week that all of this has led to significant organ damage; my liver is in early stages of failure, fatty tissue destruction in my brain/nervous system is occurring at a record rate (worst 5% of the population), and is on track for multiple sclerosis and scarier things I dare not even mention. The visual and hearing changes I am experiencing along with my balance/coordination issues and difficulty walking, etc are on the list of things that we will address in treatment. 

Next week I will slowly begin the "kill" infusions to deal with all this foreign matter in my brain/nervous system/liver. I'm scared about it, because the body has to go through a very intense process to deal with this. 

Various killing agents are introduced to kill bacteria and parasites, alongside various substances that bind to toxic matter and bring it out of the system. This is delicate business. I have seen much illness, weakness, seizures,etc, in my short time in the clinic. 

But I have also seen dozens of people leaving having concluded their treatment ... and they are walking around even though many came in unable to walk at all. I see people talking and laughing who were catatonic when they came in. I said goodbye today to a really nice man who has the same mold genetics as me, who had to retrofit his entire house to make it safe to move back into. But he was able to do it. It took him 3 months to repair his immune system and cellular state/activity. I took a picture of him with his final IV drip and watched him get his port access closed for hopefully the last time. But while this was happening, a girl about 10 feet away was having her 3rd seizure this week (that I have seen), and the man with very bad Parkinson's (who also has bad mold genetics and had extremely high mold tests and astonishingly high levels of industrial toxins) was crying softly for a very long time. 

So nobody is pulling any punches - it's clear that I will have good days and bad days. But the people who stick with it get better. There are literally thousands of before and after pictures on the walls of people who, with the help of these doctors, were able to break through the biofilm, kill the foreign organisms in their brains/nervous systems, restore healthy gut and brain barriers, rebuild cell walls and repair mitochondrial function, reverse autoimmunity and leave with functioning immune and detoxification systems. And all along the way what's happening is explained and the research and outcomes supporting the approach is readily available and extensive. 

It might be very hard but if these other people can have these outcomes, I have good reason to be hopeful. And it's time. Because its very hard to watch those closest to me suffer while I have been suffering. And because I want to have a positive active, happy life again. I want to have a family, and to spend time with my friends and my relatives who miss me, and whom I miss. All of you, for example. 

I am so grateful to those of you who have reached out to the incredibly special people who have been supporting me during this time. I wish I could be taking more care of the people I love right now the way I used to. I feel sad about the modifications my loved ones are having to make to their own lives. I keep telling myself this is all happening to make us all stronger in the end. For now I just feel alternately grateful and also sorrowful for the circumstances. 

Thanks for all your thoughts and prayers - but please try not to worry. I believe in the underlying energetics of things (don't get me started on the energetics of mold) and I know that only positive energy best be pointing in my direction. I will be doing - am doing - all I can on my side to focus on the positive* as well. 

*This might seem like a gloomy update but this process is the first time I have ever opened up so candidly about something so personal, so I consider this a positive step. 

I am thankful to you for reading this and for all the care, kind thoughts, wishes and prayers I am lucky enough to be receiving. I really love you all, and I look forward to the day we can talk and hang out again soon.