So far, I have been amazingly lucky when it comes to COVID—but now, my luck has run out. I managed to avoid catching it, even though I work with the public at the hotel job, the medical job AND the restaurant since the beginning of the pandemic—but here I am now, sitting in bed with a bottle of Nyquil and box of tissues.
Last weekend, I went outside and cut my grass, and a little bit later, I started having some serious nausea that lasted until the next day. I figured I had just got a little too hot and was suffering from a touch of heat sickness. Then I started getting a sore throat, which I assumed, at first, was likely just due to vomiting. It wasn’t until the following day that I started developing a stuffing nose and running a fever that I decided to take a home COVID test, which was negative. I figured I just had the respiratory virus that has been going around, and I went to work at the hotel that night, and then on to the healthcare job the next day.
That night, I started feeling really sick a few hours after I clocked in for my shift at the hotel. Since I was the only one there, and it is nearly impossible to reach the owner late at night. I could not leave, so I had to finish my shift. I still kind of doubted I it could be COVID—though I had some sort of raging upper respiratory infection, I still had not lost my sense of taste or smell. Still, I did not want to risk spreading it to the patients at the clinic. I stopped by my house to change clothes so I could go to work at my medical job, and decided to do another COVID test, just to be safe. Sure enough, it turned out to be positive that time—apparently, I had tested too soon the first time.
What’s worse is that I am going to have to stay off work from my healthcare job until August 21st—since I am immunocompromised due to taking medications for lupus, my medical job requires that I quarantine for 20 days. This is because a person whose immune system is weak can sometimes take longer to fight off the virus, and therefore they shed the virus for a longer period of time. My other two employers told me I can’t come back till I have a negative COVID test. Even though I am now on day 11, I still tested positive this morning—and I’m still symptomatic with a stuffy nose. (Thankfully, the sore throat is gone.)
This absolutely sucks financially, however. We no longer get COVID pay at the healthcare job—we have to use up our PTO instead. (And I don’t even have enough to cover all the hours I am going to miss out on.) It also counts against you attendance-wise. Even if you keel over with a heart attack at this job, their attendance policy treats illness the same as simply playing hookie so you can go fishing. Makes you wonder how many people come to work sick with COVID because they can’t afford to miss work or take the points on their attendance. Then there are the other two jobs. I don’t have any kind of sick leave or paid time off at those jobs. I guess I just hope I am still employed when I can finally go back to work. I’m not sure I qualify for FMLA since I have not been at my current healthcare position within the company for a year. I am part-time at the other two positions in any case.
Hopefully, I will be able to withdraw some money from my tiny 401k in order to make up for the shortfall.
My oldest daughter is sick too—I gave her my box of Paxlovid since she does not have insurance and I think she is sicker than I am. Thankfully, my daughter with severe autism has not had any symptoms yet—hopefully she will avoid getting sick.
There are a lot of people out there in the same predicament I am. They can’t afford to take time off work—either because they don’t have enough paid time off, or their employer’s attendance policy doesn’t really help you when you are sick. How many cases of COVID could have been prevented at the height of the pandemic if people could stay home from work when they needed to, and they did not have to fear losing their jobs?
Oh, and on a final note, don’t assume that “stomach flu” or bout with “allergies” is not COVID—I have been hearing from a lot of people who have had atypical symptoms —for example, I never lost my sense of taste or smell and don’t have a cough, and my illness started with nausea. A co-worker developed a rash for a few days before she started having more typical symptoms.
Thanks for stopping by and reading—I have not told anyone in my family about this. I don’t want my brother to worry, and I don’t want to deal with the crazy ones who will be trying to get me to ingest horse paste.
