Man..224 days since the last post & we're STILL dealing with COVID. I'm pretty sure it's completely changed me as a person.

Right before Thanksgiving, I took a phone call at work from a lady who needed to cancel her appointment because she had been testing positive since mid-October. Once she was asymptomatic, her doctor told her it was okay for her to go out as long as she "masked up & stayed safe". She only went to her mother's funeral, who died from COVID. It was such a heavy call.

My next call was from a patient who was asking about testing prior to her procedure. She rambled about all she'd seen on FB & was truly so misinformed. She went on to tell me that she was planning to host her entire "12+" family for Thanksgiving. She said she just wasn't going to worry about COVID, planned to enjoy herself & would just "be really careful around the babies".

I was shocked and appalled. It took me several hours of chewing on it to really realize that I was hella ANGRY.

Caller #1 won't ever get another holiday with her mom. Caller #2 was less than 3 feet from me the Tuesday after Thanksgiving.

This week, after telling a patient (less than 3 feet from me) to put a mask on, he told that "masks aren't required at his house". Yeah, great, ya ass. Put one on or go the hell home with your 98 year old mother in tow.

ANGRY.

I feel really exhausted with people & am to the point of struggling with my "non-sick people" healthcare career. I'm running our office by myself through mid January and every single day, I get at least one call from a patient that is sick or has experienced a death of a loved one from COVID.

Hopefully we're better off in another 224 days. I'm trying like hell to do my part & that's really all I can do.

I live in a rural part of the country, and up until around August our case numbers were really low and stable. Now we're the worst in the state in cases per-million (or we were last I heard, sometime last month). There's a college in my city and I see out-of-state license plates everywhere. Groups of college students roving around without masks. They were holding in-person classes, until the state issued an order to close schools. Gee, what could have possibly happened? /sarcasm

I work in an adult foster home taking care of adults with developmental disabilities. The company employs a lot of college students because the pay is bad and it's a hard job. I have a particularly stupid coworker (a college student) who went who-knows-where over Thanksgiving, and is now out of work for 10 days because, surprise! he was around someone who tested positive!

Fast forward to today, and I find myself feeling like crap since yesterday. Sore throat and constant fatigue. I'm not sure if it's covid, but because of how vulnerable the people I take care of are, I'm out of work for 10 days myself. And on top of that I feel guilty for staying home and missing work because someone has to cover my shifts. Like I'm making it up or something to get out of work, but I'm not. This fatigue is really unusual but I don't feel horrific overall so part of my brain says I should still be at work.

My 95-year-old grandmother passed away October first. I'm grateful she never got covid. I'm hoping my 94-year-old grandfather doesn't end up getting it.