5 ms·

FWIW, not Covid related, but I had shortness of breath, chest pain, fatigue- dealt with it for a while, eventually went to a Dr. Full battery of heart and lung

FWIW, not Covid related, but I had shortness of breath, chest pain, fatigue- dealt with it for a while, eventually went to a Dr. Full battery of heart and lung tests, turns out heart and lungs are almost flawless for my age and general health. At Dr’s recommendation, see a psychiatrist, dr gives me some anti-anxiety medication to try, and I feel better almost immediately. Spend a few months working on behavioral response to stress, breathing exercises, etc., then go off the medicine. Total game changer. The mind and human body are funny things.

kavalg 5y ago
Thanks for pointing that out and great to hear that you are OK now. I will definitely do more tests to find the root cause. I also heard of a test where you are up on a thread mill, gradually varying load and they are measuring you heart parameters at the same time. Have you done this test as well?
gonehome 5y ago
Similar for me, thought I was dying because of the intensity of physical symptoms. Got a lot of blood tests, turned out it was anxiety related - I was surprised at the intensity of physical symptoms that can happen from it. While I’d guess some “long Covid” is related to serious cases that caused underlying organ damage, my suspicion is in the more general cases where vague symptoms are described it’s probably anxiety.
- spazrunaway 5y ago
  I had a similar situation, and definitely had anxiety, but I absolutely do not believe that explains everything. I had a temperature of 99.5-100.5 for several months after having "recovered" from covid, and none of my doctors believed "psychogenic fever" was a valid thing. In my case, I'd been dealing with anxiety my whole life, but it never caused physical symptoms. Then I had covid, felt better for 2 weeks, then suddenly started experiencing low-grade fever, night sweats, fatigue, no appetite inability to sleep for days on end (this was the worst. would feel like I stopped breathing whenever I started drifting off, and it felt like my body would then jump-start itself and violently kick me back awake). None of my doctors knew anything about long covid, and I started to wonder if I was dying of cancer or something. The symptoms were distressing enough to make anxiety a logical response. So, yeah, at some point, anxiety probably created additional symptoms, or made me more distressed by my symptoms, but neither I nor any doctors I've met believe anxiety can cause a fever, at the very least.
  - ovi256 5y ago
    > I stopped breathing whenever I started drifting off, and it felt like my body would then jump-start itself and violently kick me back awake That sounds a lot like sleep apnea, and will kill prematurely if left untreated. You should get a sleep study to check that.
    - spazrunaway 5y ago
      I did an overnight oximetry test for that a few months ago, it was apparently fine.
  - gonehome 5y ago
    There could very well be a non-anxiety effect and I'm not trying to dismiss that. For me, I've experienced the difficulty sleeping, early morning wakefulness, heart rate, nausea, stomach issues, and sweats as physical symptoms of anxiety. A big/scary event (getting covid, death of family) can make the physical symptoms more apparent. Not sure about low grade fever, but it wouldn't surprise me. Again, doesn't mean it's not something else but I think people tend to dismiss anxiety as someone not taking the claims seriously - when to me anxiety symptoms are serious and miserable, they just require different treatment (unfortunately Hypervigilance makes things worse when anxious about symptoms and thinking they're not anxiety related). I still have a hard time telling the difference between actual infection/physical illness and anxiety personally even knowing all this about myself - it's hard.

kavalg 5y ago

Thanks for pointing that out and great to hear that you are OK now. I will definitely do more tests to find the root cause. I also heard of a test where you are up on a thread mill, gradually varying load and they are measuring you heart parameters at the same time. Have you done this test as well?

gonehome 5y ago

Similar for me, thought I was dying because of the intensity of physical symptoms. Got a lot of blood tests, turned out it was anxiety related - I was surprised at the intensity of physical symptoms that can happen from it. While I’d guess some “long Covid” is related to serious cases that caused underlying organ damage, my suspicion is in the more general cases where vague symptoms are described it’s probably anxiety.

spazrunaway 5y ago
I had a similar situation, and definitely had anxiety, but I absolutely do not believe that explains everything. I had a temperature of 99.5-100.5 for several months after having "recovered" from covid, and none of my doctors believed "psychogenic fever" was a valid thing. In my case, I'd been dealing with anxiety my whole life, but it never caused physical symptoms. Then I had covid, felt better for 2 weeks, then suddenly started experiencing low-grade fever, night sweats, fatigue, no appetite inability to sleep for days on end (this was the worst. would feel like I stopped breathing whenever I started drifting off, and it felt like my body would then jump-start itself and violently kick me back awake). None of my doctors knew anything about long covid, and I started to wonder if I was dying of cancer or something. The symptoms were distressing enough to make anxiety a logical response. So, yeah, at some point, anxiety probably created additional symptoms, or made me more distressed by my symptoms, but neither I nor any doctors I've met believe anxiety can cause a fever, at the very least.
- ovi256 5y ago
  > I stopped breathing whenever I started drifting off, and it felt like my body would then jump-start itself and violently kick me back awake That sounds a lot like sleep apnea, and will kill prematurely if left untreated. You should get a sleep study to check that.
  - spazrunaway 5y ago
    I did an overnight oximetry test for that a few months ago, it was apparently fine.
- gonehome 5y ago
  There could very well be a non-anxiety effect and I'm not trying to dismiss that. For me, I've experienced the difficulty sleeping, early morning wakefulness, heart rate, nausea, stomach issues, and sweats as physical symptoms of anxiety. A big/scary event (getting covid, death of family) can make the physical symptoms more apparent. Not sure about low grade fever, but it wouldn't surprise me. Again, doesn't mean it's not something else but I think people tend to dismiss anxiety as someone not taking the claims seriously - when to me anxiety symptoms are serious and miserable, they just require different treatment (unfortunately Hypervigilance makes things worse when anxious about symptoms and thinking they're not anxiety related). I still have a hard time telling the difference between actual infection/physical illness and anxiety personally even knowing all this about myself - it's hard.