4 ms·

I had something a few weeks ago. I completely lost my sense of smell/taste for a week. No congestion. 102 fever, very tired. I was out for a whole week. Mild sh

I had something a few weeks ago. I completely lost my sense of smell/taste for a week. No congestion. 102 fever, very tired. I was out for a whole week. Mild shortness of breath doing normal things. The loss of smell/taste was nothing like I had experienced. It continued after my fever was gone. It was like a switch was flipped and it was turned off. Usually congestion makes me lose taste, but this was very different. Usually through breathing or snuffing a bit I could smell or taste something. I couldn't even smell my baby's poopy diapers. I was beginning to think it was never going to come back. One week later out of the blue it slowly came back to normal. Everyone I know became sick too with varying degrees of illness. One of them couldn't breath at 2 am and went to urgent care and was given steroids. My co-worker with asthma ended up in the hospital for a week. I'm starting to think we all had coronovirus. Edit: i looked back and it was the 16th of February

toasterlovin 7y ago
You had a fever and shortness of breath and you didn’t suspect coronavirus? No offense, but have you been living under a rock?
- jacquesm 7y ago
  A few weeks ago, in a location where the virus had not been confirmed yet, that could easily happen. The situation is changing so fast that a few weeks - or even days - can make a huge difference.
- jryan49 7y ago
  It might of been more than a month now. The virus was in the news on January and then kind of disappeared out of the news. The way it was being reported too was that it was contained in China and hasn't made it out. I thought maybe I had it but it I thought it was unlikely considering the news.
  - toasterlovin 7y ago
    Fair enough. I guess the idea that a disease which had exploded in the way it did in China could ever possibly be contained doesn't really make sense to me, but maybe you don't live in a place with a lot of asian immigrants. I'm on the west coast of the U.S. and there are just huge numbers of asian immigrants here. There's just no feasible way a disease in China could somehow not make its way here. Way too many flights and way too many people here with connections to China.
    - jryan49 7y ago
      I'm in Philly, my wife travels through phl (intl airport) quite often for work and we have a sizable Asian population. I was just naive to think we had a handle on this thing.
- rglullis 7y ago
  My kids (3 year old and 6mo) and I had the exact same set of symptoms in Berlin around the 12th of February, except that we had lower fever. My wife showed no symptoms. We went to the pediatrician and it was diagnosed just as a standard flu + bronchitis. The baby was prescribed an inhaler with Salbumamol. I am already asthmatic so I just treated it as it getting temporarily out of control. We all had about rough 3-4 days but nothing that ever made us feel like an extraordinary case. When you have a 3 year old going to the Kita, you just assume that they will always bring something home. I am working from home and we already had a flight scheduled for the end of February, so even after the kid got better we didn't take her to the Kita to avoid getting anything else. Now, I still think that what we had was just a seasonal flu, but I really would like to get some test to remove all doubt.
  - jryan49 7y ago
    My wife only coughed a lot for a week. I was semi bed ridden for about 3 days. It was definitely not the worst flu I've had. I did feel very tried for a week and slept a lot more than usual after those 3-4 days
    - rglullis 7y ago
      Pretty much the same. The one thing that is really making me wonder now is that I got anosmia and that never happened before. It was so novel to me that I spent a good part of an hour reading about anosmia caused by flu and commented with my wife how weird it was. I usually have a very good appetite, even when sick. The anosmia caused appetite loss and all I wanted was to drink water + vitamin C
      - jryan49 7y ago
        Yeah I've never had it before either after reading this it feels like a red flag. I also lost my appetite and lost about 5 pounds, but that just may have been from anxiety.
et_tu_brewte 7y ago
Did your baby get sick? With a one year old, that’s my biggest fear.
- jryan49 7y ago
  Yes. He was 11 months at the time. He had 102 fever and I thought he was breathing a bit heavily when sleeping but he didn't seem to care during the day and was running around happy the most of the time. He was only really tied for one day. We both took small doses of Tylenol to keep the fever at 100. He had slightly runny nose too which made me think it might of been something else.
  - et_tu_brewte 7y ago
    Thank you for replying. Not that we know 100% you had COVID, but this is helpful. There is next to zero information regarding very young children ... like under 3. I hope it truly is because it isn’t affecting them but at the same time, I think how strong can a 22 month olds immune system really be.
    - robk 7y ago
      Purely anecdotal but my wife is a doctor and plugged into a lot of other uk doctor moms and it feels like new children are doing relatively well thankfully. A friend had her 6 week old contract it and she's already back home and out of hospital now after just a few days of readmission. Never safe but hope this can give you a slight bit of good news.
    - joshstrange 7y ago
      KY has had 2 young cases so far (8 mo old and 6yr old). The 8mo old didn't need to be hospitalized and the 6yr old was in the hospital for a handful of days and is now at home. Both are expected to recover AFAIK.
travisporter 7y ago
It may still have been flu; a 102 fever is higher than expected for covid, although definitely not excluded
- jryan49 7y ago
  Yes. I agree. None of us were tested for the flu either so we don't really know. We all did have our flu shots however in November. I've never had the loss the smell taste though with the flu. This also didn't hit me like the flu. I felt kind of tired for a few days before I got really sick. My wife ended up with just a dry cough for a week. She would be very tied randomly some nights.
- robocat 7y ago
  I am guessing it is 10x more likely to be Covid19 (and Baysian is even higher if you know community transmission is currently occurring in your area). While Anosmia is commonly caused by flu, the flu doesn’t commonly cause anosmia. If anyone can find what percentage of people with flu/cold present with Anosmia as a symptom (without having a blocked nose), I would love to know,

toasterlovin 7y ago

You had a fever and shortness of breath and you didn’t suspect coronavirus? No offense, but have you been living under a rock?

jacquesm 7y ago
A few weeks ago, in a location where the virus had not been confirmed yet, that could easily happen. The situation is changing so fast that a few weeks - or even days - can make a huge difference.
jryan49 7y ago
It might of been more than a month now. The virus was in the news on January and then kind of disappeared out of the news. The way it was being reported too was that it was contained in China and hasn't made it out. I thought maybe I had it but it I thought it was unlikely considering the news.
- toasterlovin 7y ago
  Fair enough. I guess the idea that a disease which had exploded in the way it did in China could ever possibly be contained doesn't really make sense to me, but maybe you don't live in a place with a lot of asian immigrants. I'm on the west coast of the U.S. and there are just huge numbers of asian immigrants here. There's just no feasible way a disease in China could somehow not make its way here. Way too many flights and way too many people here with connections to China.
  - jryan49 7y ago
    I'm in Philly, my wife travels through phl (intl airport) quite often for work and we have a sizable Asian population. I was just naive to think we had a handle on this thing.
rglullis 7y ago
My kids (3 year old and 6mo) and I had the exact same set of symptoms in Berlin around the 12th of February, except that we had lower fever. My wife showed no symptoms. We went to the pediatrician and it was diagnosed just as a standard flu + bronchitis. The baby was prescribed an inhaler with Salbumamol. I am already asthmatic so I just treated it as it getting temporarily out of control. We all had about rough 3-4 days but nothing that ever made us feel like an extraordinary case. When you have a 3 year old going to the Kita, you just assume that they will always bring something home. I am working from home and we already had a flight scheduled for the end of February, so even after the kid got better we didn't take her to the Kita to avoid getting anything else. Now, I still think that what we had was just a seasonal flu, but I really would like to get some test to remove all doubt.
- jryan49 7y ago
  My wife only coughed a lot for a week. I was semi bed ridden for about 3 days. It was definitely not the worst flu I've had. I did feel very tried for a week and slept a lot more than usual after those 3-4 days
  - rglullis 7y ago
    Pretty much the same. The one thing that is really making me wonder now is that I got anosmia and that never happened before. It was so novel to me that I spent a good part of an hour reading about anosmia caused by flu and commented with my wife how weird it was. I usually have a very good appetite, even when sick. The anosmia caused appetite loss and all I wanted was to drink water + vitamin C
    - jryan49 7y ago
      Yeah I've never had it before either after reading this it feels like a red flag. I also lost my appetite and lost about 5 pounds, but that just may have been from anxiety.

et_tu_brewte 7y ago

Did your baby get sick? With a one year old, that’s my biggest fear.

jryan49 7y ago
Yes. He was 11 months at the time. He had 102 fever and I thought he was breathing a bit heavily when sleeping but he didn't seem to care during the day and was running around happy the most of the time. He was only really tied for one day. We both took small doses of Tylenol to keep the fever at 100. He had slightly runny nose too which made me think it might of been something else.
- et_tu_brewte 7y ago
  Thank you for replying. Not that we know 100% you had COVID, but this is helpful. There is next to zero information regarding very young children ... like under 3. I hope it truly is because it isn’t affecting them but at the same time, I think how strong can a 22 month olds immune system really be.
  - robk 7y ago
    Purely anecdotal but my wife is a doctor and plugged into a lot of other uk doctor moms and it feels like new children are doing relatively well thankfully. A friend had her 6 week old contract it and she's already back home and out of hospital now after just a few days of readmission. Never safe but hope this can give you a slight bit of good news.
  - joshstrange 7y ago
    KY has had 2 young cases so far (8 mo old and 6yr old). The 8mo old didn't need to be hospitalized and the 6yr old was in the hospital for a handful of days and is now at home. Both are expected to recover AFAIK.

travisporter 7y ago

It may still have been flu; a 102 fever is higher than expected for covid, although definitely not excluded

jryan49 7y ago
Yes. I agree. None of us were tested for the flu either so we don't really know. We all did have our flu shots however in November. I've never had the loss the smell taste though with the flu. This also didn't hit me like the flu. I felt kind of tired for a few days before I got really sick. My wife ended up with just a dry cough for a week. She would be very tied randomly some nights.
robocat 7y ago
I am guessing it is 10x more likely to be Covid19 (and Baysian is even higher if you know community transmission is currently occurring in your area). While Anosmia is commonly caused by flu, the flu doesn’t commonly cause anosmia. If anyone can find what percentage of people with flu/cold present with Anosmia as a symptom (without having a blocked nose), I would love to know,