29 weeks - Covid positive
Well…the title says it all. Currently I am 29 weeks and also Covid positive. I tested positive last Wednesday morning. Before I get into the mushy feelings stuff, I’m fine. Wednesday I was pretty sick but I’ve gotten better every day since. The doctor wanted me to take Paxlovid, but when I asked what trials have been done in pregnant people he said there hasn’t been very many studies done. I later found out there was one in Mice and a micro study in about 50 woman that both showed it was safe. In my mind…that’s not nearly enough evidence. Especially after finding out cold medicine isn’t safe for pregnancy, it makes me super nervous to take something that’s really untested. There have been drugs in the past that were thought safe by doctors for pregnant people and in fact ended up being very unsafe for the fetus. You have 5 days to take Paxlovid after the onset of Covid symptoms, that would have been Saturday. My thought was, if I get MUCH worse and it looks like I’m going to be hospitalized then I’ll take Paxlovid, but if it turns out to be a mild case then I wont. Turns out it has been a mild case, so no drugs for me.
Now onto the mushy feelings stuff. When I saw that positive covid test line at first I didn’t really believe it. I’d had a cold 2 weeks before and this felt exactly the same. I don’t even really know why I tested. So I did another test which came back positive as well. Then the disbelief turned into “well…what do I do now?” I had gotten up super early because I had a very busy day planned. I put my pajamas back on and decided to get some work done while I was still feeling pretty good. I assumed as the day went on I’d feel worse and worse. It was about 6 am and far to early to call the doctor. Drew wasn’t up yet either. So I really didn’t have anyone to process the news with.
As I started to check email, the knowledge that I had a viral infection that has killed tens of thousands of people started to grow on me. I never really worried that I would die, we know a lot more about the disease now then we did 3 years ago. But for the first time since I got pregnant I got scared about losing Ellie. It seemed like the first big complication since actually conceiving (which we had just a tiny bit of difficulty with). The reality of the unknown of how having Covid would effect my pregnancy turned into relentless tears. Logically I knew I needed to talk to the doctor first, there wasn’t an immediate concern, we needed to see how the disease progressed, lots of pregnant people get covid and they and the baby are fine. I knew all that, in my head. But I couldn’t get the tears to stop flowing. Eventually Drew got up, I told him I had covid and we sat in the living room to talk about it. I was still crying. Drew asked if something was wrong with my eyes and I replied it was called crying. We both laughed. I didn’t sound like I was crying, I wasn’t sobbing heavily. There were just tears running down my face and I had no ability to control it. Actually I was actively trying to just let it be and not control it. I’m a control freak and I’ve had a hard time connecting my emotions to this pregnancy. I’ve shoved all the possible negative and positive feelings down, trying to just guard my heart from getting hurt. This seemed like a beautiful and pure reaction to scary information. It seemed normal. I was trying to let myself experience it.
I read a book recently called “Come as you are” which is actually about sexuality. BUT, in the book she also talks about the trauma cycle and how it’s important to let your body “complete the cycle”. Basically that means when we experience trauma, emotional or physical our bodies have a physical response which often we don’t let ourselves experience so we get stuck. My act of letting myself cry was an attempt to complete the cycle.
As I’ve physically healed from Covid, I’ve spent a LOT of time on the couch or in bed, crocheting, listening to books, watching bad TV and just trying to get better. Here are a few pictures of the last week.
