Have you been sick a lot lately?

Yes, but I have long Covid and it’s clear my immune system is useless. I don’t fully recover from any illness before it seems I’m rundown with the next one.

Unfortunately with a teenager in school and no masking or air purifying happening he brings home the germs. (I barely go anywhere except outdoor, distanced or mask when I need to run into a store).

He was out of school all last week. Covid, Flu, Strep tests all negative, but he’s very run down, no appetite, coughing, sinus stuff. He’s now on an antibiotic for his secondary sinus and chest infections.

Definitely sick of being sick but this seems to be the “let it rip” plan in action, idk.

No thank goodness. Nothing seems to be making its rounds here. Too hot for that. I think my area will have a late cold/flu season.

Since 2020, I have only been sick 1 times and that was with Covid back in Feb of this year.

I think for me wearing a mask in certain situations and having a good handle on my allergies has really helped.

There is a lot of stuff going around here. I'm a sub teacher. In early September I was sitting on a kid sized chair reading to the class when a kid stood up to get a Kleenex and sneezed right in my face. Of course a few days later I had a bad cold. 2 weeks later I had a hysterectomy and 2 other surgical repairs. The cough is still lingering and isn't making healing fun.

My 13 year old has been sick with a fever off and on since early September. She was as high as 104 at one point but we were able to get it down. I called advice and they said to keep doing what we're doing and if it gets worse and we can't get it down to call them. She would go to school on days it was below 100.4. She missed 6 days across 10 school days. When she started coughing and being congested I had DH take her in. The doctor checked her ears- one was more irritated than the other, he checked her throat- small white patches. She was given amoxicillin. They did a full blood panel, strep, RSV, flu, covid, EBV, urine. EBV capsid came back positive as well as a 20% abnormal WBC result. She had mono. She FINALLY was fever free Friday night and has stayed that way. She was so tired. The doctor pulled her from gymnastics and PE until Nov 1 to make sure her spleen and liver recover. Fun times in our house! Thankfully she's got a 2 week fall break (last week and this week) and can go back when school starts again.

I find this site helpful when trying to figure out what might be going around in my area: data.wastewaterscan.org/
I have a family member that took 5 days after feeling symptoms to test positive for Covid so I suspect a lot of people think they don't have Covid when they actually do. She was testing daily for her job. On the one hand her immune system was doing well at keeping the virus from taking over her body for a while, but on the other, Paxlovid has a window when it needs to be taken. I hate being sick so I just never stopped masking in indoor public places. I've only been sick once since 2020, but it does seem like people are generally getting sick more often then before.

The poor thing, that's a really long time to have a fever! I hope she gets the rest she needs to recover fully.

🙀 He's a baby! How can he possibly be going to school? Time really does fly.

He has a new little cousin who was born exactly 3.5 years to the day after him and when I hold her all I can think about is how fast it all went.

Since January or so, I've had 10 or so sinus/ear/respiratory infections.

The worst of it started in late May, after our big work event. It felt like I was swallowing glass, so my PCP (god bless her) called in some antibiotics for me without me coming into the office.

Here's the fun timeline since then:
- The antibiotics helped... a little.
- In July, I had a few symptoms of sinusitis off and on since late May and they're not sure exactly what it is or how to effectively treat it.
- I got bloodwork at my appointment to check for mono, throat culture, a chest X-ray script in the case it is pneumonia, and was told to also follow up with an ENT. Bloodwork showed elevated white blood cells, and the EBV results indicated a past infection (positive starts at >21.9 -- the Ab VCA was 103, and nuclear antigen was 452).
- ENT suggested acid reflux as a potential reason for the continuous ear and throat pain. Uh, okay?
- Then later in July, here's another ear infection.
- Feel fine for a while...
- Late August: another round of antibiotics, and a CT scan of my sinuses. PCP suggests perhaps allergy shots.
- Make an appointment with the allergist. She says that allergy shots won't help because what I'm allergic to is more springtime, but thinks perhaps there's an immunodeficiency we're not aware of. Off for more bloodwork!
- So I did those labs same day because I wanted results as soon as possible. So all the antibody levels were normal.... But every.single.one (except one) of the 23 pneumococcal antibodies was low.
- Send this over to primary care. She's like, aha. this makes sense. So she suggested I get a pneumonia vaccine to boost those levels (#34goingon67).
- The CT scan results: Lots of mucus in my sinuses, some of which is blocking stuff on both sides, and a deviated septum.
- So that, plus my super low pneumococcal antibody levels, def explains why I keep getting infections. (at least that's what I've been telling myself.)
- I sent my ENT both results. She hasn't gotten back to me yet about the labs, but did say, and I shit you not about the CT: "Great - it appears you do have some chronic sinus problems." OBVIOUSLY. (I did tell my PCP about her response and she's like... "That was such a helpful comment! hahah" and also gave me the name of a different ENT for a second opinion because why the hell not at this point.)
- So I did a follow-up with the first ENT a week-ish ago and she was not terribly helpful; I have the second opinion visit in two weeks; and I will also do bloodwork again around the same time to see if the vaccine does what it's supposed to and raise my antibody levels (the antibodies that I'm deficient in can cause the repeated respiratory infections).
- Of course, as luck would have it, I'm feeling a little meh today, but hopefully it's just from doing a lot last week. I have my annual wellness visit on Friday with my PCP, and I'm sure we'll chat about all of this.

Whew! Sorry for that novel!

I haven't been sick in a very long time. Very long. And I have never had Covid.  But just on Saturday, I said to Jeremy I thought I was coming down with something. My throat hurts. I slept like 10 hours Saturday night and I felt OK for most of yesterday but by bedtime, not only did my throat hurt, but my nose was stuffy. I slept terrible last night because I couldn't breathe. Now this morning, I'm up but I'm so tired, my throat still hurts and it's radiating up into my ear. My head feels terrible. But at least, sitting up, my nose isn't too stuffed up like it was laying down. I got very lucky as I have a really light day at work, with no meetings. But I'm feeling like I'm just sick enough for it to be annoying.

I don't want to jinx myself but the last time I was sick was last summer with Covid. I'm going into October with lots of visitors and things going on so I'm hoping to stay healthy. I work from home and live alone so I'm not really around a ton of people but that will change this month. I've got some concerts to go to and generally being out and around more so more exposure to potential illnesses. 

I'm not getting sick, but I haven't been feeling the best for the past month. I've had headaches that last for days and I feel fatigued. I blame it 100% on the high weed and grass pollens here.

My husband brought home a nasty cold in July and it took forever to feel better again. Then two weeks ago he brought another cold home. This was a much milder case thank goodness but still have a bit of sinus congestion here and there but at least there wasn’t the fatigue that didn’t want to go away like the first time. This is the first time I have been sick since Covid. Hubby brought something else home last year but he was banished as we thought it may have been vivid but luckily it wasn’t and we didn’t catch it. None of us has had Covid yet but I really thought we had broken the streak. I’m afraid that this winter that will change. Not only is hubby back at work full time - has been for a year now but DS has started in person college classes - he did all online during Covid and then up until this semester in college online as well.

Is it possible you're having a mono flare?  That wouldn't show a current mono infection would it?  My DD has the capsid but not prior antibodies.  If she has a flare, I don't think it would pick up the capsid but would show antibodies.