I was so tired. Absolute tired. Then I think after my first one week it was just tiredness. Then I think by second week the tiredness started reducing. I was still tired but I was not sleeping constantly. But I don’t know if it’s like…I am generally not a very nervous person you know I have always read the books about this anxiety attacks and all that. I’m, I am not a person like that at all you know. I am generally a calm controlled and I know what’s going on I think. I’m sure other people are like that as well. I think the second week I could feel that I was getting anxiety attacks. But I could not put it down why. So you know you think about logically, you know husband at home, kids are fine, we don’t have any job insecurities, my work was really supportive they said you can come back any time you want, there is no pressure of working at all so they are very supportive. So you think about it logically there is nothing that makes me nervous and I almost recovered from it because my tiredness was going away. I had no fever, no classic symptoms so you think of the head there is no reason to be anxious but I was getting anxiety attacks at night.
 
And generally I am not that kind of a person, I have never had that. So I even, this was my husband asking you know, I can’t figure out or what is happening because that’s not who I am. I don’t know if it made any sense and he said maybe it is just you sitting at home, general stuff and ah I don’t know there are some studies saying that it could be just your, you know Covid is affecting the brain and you know. And I think maybe being a rational or you know you think about logically, I can think logically because for reasons I think of it like a flu and I could not figure out why it was affecting my brain you know. I don’t, I think my thinking capacity reduced a little bit but not to that extra you know I forget stuff, nothing like that. Just the general tiredness but more than general tiredness and anxiety attacks I was worrying. I think at night I will hold my husband’s hand very, very tightly at night and the thing is I could not place why I was doing that because nothing was worrying me. You know things like that, I think one morning he woke up with his arm fully bruised. Seems like I scratched him at night [laughs]!

And when the test came back positive for you how did you feel… seeing it there?

I think, I was relieved to be honest with you. I know that, ok that is the reason I was feeling tired… You know, you know it’s almost like an uncertainty in the, why is this? And oh now I know this is Covid. You know and I was not feeling really tired, I was just feeling a little bit tired in the first week but then I thought oh that’s how it’s going to be for me and that’s when it properly hit me, that’s different. In that first full week I was still working through it. Everything was… I was feeling tired but I’m, I’m ok but I didn’t know what is making me tired. But when the test came back positive oh, that’s the reason why. So it’s like ok, that’s good.

I am still taking it easy you know one day if I feel tired I am telling my manager, not feeling great today you know can I just take a half day off and he says yeah that’s absolutely fine. So, they are very, very supportive and because the year end is really busy as well, but they are very supportive. And if I want to take a break I just tell them no today is not my day just wanna take a break not because of my anxiety or anything but because I am generally feeling tired. You know some day maybe I have a late night and I don’t sleep well at night because I can’t properly lie down and sleep um you know so I do take breaks. I don’t think it has anything to do with work because in work I am not stressed out at all even though it is the year end because I know how supportive they are.

You know having the kids stay at home they need I think you think about unfairness of it. You know they’re at home, they can’t see their friends they are… I am not about the education bit of it, part of it at all, they are kids. At least that’s my take on it. They are sponges, they will just take it up. Well the whole world is going through it. So I am not worried or tense about how it’s going to affect their education but I am more worried about that they don’t see their friends, you know they need that kind of you know social interaction.

By the beginning of Feb I didn’t, I didn’t have any fever, I didn’t have any cough I didn’t have any general symptoms of Covid, absolutely nothing but I was feeling really, really tired and you get this fluey feeling. You don’t have any fever or I don’t, I didn’t have any fever but I had a really bad fluey feeling but I thought because a year end is approaching and I had always working it’s being at home and he is so hard working and all that, I thought it was just a general and you know you don’t feel good anyway about you know sitting at home, you are not meeting anybody, my family is in India and it’s like so worrying anyway because you know numbers are going up there so I just put it down to the general I’m not feeling great because I’m not going out or whatever and then all of that for five days was that I was feeling really tired. Then by Thursday I felt, I felt that something was not right, and I told my husband something was not right, and he said that why don’t we do, you know, a Covid test because he was not feeling great. A couple of his colleagues had Covid.