Covid finally ran me down

 It was inevitable, during a pandemic that I would get in the fray with everyone else and I finally did. Linda and I have been amazed that it took this long to get exposed to Covid and actually get sick.  Linda and I have both very diligent on getting our shots and staying out of risky situations. Last Saturday morning I was hot and feeling rather poorly and I tested for Covid and it was positive in 30 seconds.  Time had ran out on my luck and Covid had finally tracked me down and caught me.   Linda is in the medical field and knew of some new Emergency Use Authorization  drugs that were on the market  for treatment of people in my health category of high blood pressure and age.

   We set up a urgent care video appointment and the nurse practitioner prescribed the medical treatment Linda was suggesting I do--Paxlovid.  This stuff is free and used under the Emergency Use Authorization rules. 

We picked it up at Walgreens and I started the course.  Paxlovid is a 5 day program where you take 3 pills in the morning and three at night.   It has helped immensely.     I am currently on day 4 of treatment and my fever is gone, it lasted 2 nights, smell is still good, but I do taste metal.  I think the taste situation is from a side effect of taking the Paxlovid.   I retested today (Tuesday) for covid and was still faintly positive.   We are getting improvement, plus my energy is coming back as well.    

I use the Oura ring to monitor my sleep and that has been very interesting.  The first two nights, my body temperature was up over 2 degrees from my normal baseline and I was sweating it out.   Last night my body temperature was back near normal and I felt so much better, I just had a hard time getting to sleep, too much energy left over from all the sitting around in  the house?   

What was the source of the infection?   Linda and I went to see the Bucks play Wednesday night and had a lot of fun in their victory over San Antonio.  I think somewhere in that building I got exposed.   I have been training regularly and on Friday when I was done with my work out, I did not feel that good and thought my body is telling me it needs to have had the day off.  No, it was the early part of the covid infection getting started.  My lower body was achy and tired.   Saturday was a lot my body pain and fever.  I have had little lung issues during this covid infestation, for which I am really glad.   Linda has been testing every day, but has not found any positive result to date--which I am really glad about for her. 

Short term I am doing fine with Covid.  I am well enough to do a blog! Hopefully my long term problems will be easy to manage as well.   

We have some other catching up to do from my blogging absence.   While we are doing medical stuff, I recently had an issue with my collar bone and needed surgery.    I was trimming some brush around my new house on October 1 and had finished removing several very old bushes from near the house, I think they were original.  A large tree near the side porch had a limb that was dying and since I already had the chain saw and ladder out, I thought I would trim it off.  The limb was about 10 feet from the ground and I set the large step ladder up against the tree on the lower side.  It was a risky set up and I knew that, but it was only one limb and the last cut of the day.  The tree was a Norway maple, which is quite brittle, and I was not aware to this tree's characteristics until later.   I was standing 7 feet off the ground on a leaning step ladder and while about half way through my cut, the limb snapped off, hit the ground, bounced back and the big end of the limb took the ladder out from under me, just like that.   I landed face first on the limb and ladder and had the saw in my hands over my head...this had to be a very fine sight to see.   I was conscious...barely.. and shut off the saw and tried to get up.  It was several minutes before I could really move well, I was teetering on passing out.   I fought the consciousness really hard and hung on.  I was also bleeding from the mouth and my right knee needed 4 stitches from landing on the ladder.  Plus my shoulder was just killing me.  The last time I broke my collar bone I did pass out for several minutes.  More on that later. 

Prior to Surgery

My face got beat up pretty good

 My wife was not home and I finally got into the house, and took a shower, I always shower if possible before going to a hospital.   When Linda got home, she took one look at me and asked " what happened to you? ".  I was white as the proverbial sheet. We headed to the local hospital and they had wonderful care and did a lot of testing and found my right collar bone was broken as well as my right wrist bone. I knew the collar was broke--it felt like gravel in there. I had some bruised up ribs, but nothing else to report. I was prescribed some pain relievers sent home with                                         an  appointment next week to a shoulder specialist.

Nice screw work

 This shoulder specialist looks at my shoulder and said we could do nothing and hope for a proper heal or surgery and install a plate.  I am looking at the X-ray and opted for the surgery.  This collar bone was broken when I was 25 and had never really healed properly and that shoulder was always a bit shorter and sleeping on that side was not an option.  I was tired of a bad shoulder.  The surgery was scheduled for late next week and as soon as it was done, my should felt way better.  I was restricted for 4 weeks on activity and soon as I got the OK, back to the gym and treadmill.  

The big bone on the lower left is broken

I had lost a lot of muscle mass and looked puny, but it came back slowly as I started to get stronger and increase my work loads.   The shoulder is now 100%, my wrist is still ouchy when pushing a heavy straight bar, but it is improving weekly.  I would call my wrist 85%.   My ladder is still in the garage.  

I have been pushing since mid November and my recent times and height have been good and now it is time to switch to the outdoors season.   If we can get rid of the snow here in Wisconsin, and I can get cleared from Covid.......it is always something.  I will just keep grinding, lets put it that way.