DAZE WORK: It could happen to you, too

Over a tasty Hoosier tenderloin and an ice-filled glass of tea the other afternoon, I listened to a story we all should hear.

A friend of mine stopped by the table to chat, and what he shared with me admittedly scared the daylights out of me.

He is a COVID-19 survivor. Caught the dastardly disease, battled it for several weeks, recovered and is doing pretty well now.

However, the story he shared was more than enlightening about this COVID concern.

My buddy, let’s call him Bob. What about Bob, you ask. Well, as ubiquitous and palindromic as Bob may be, it’s a good pseudonym for a fine fellow who has provided significant community involvement over the years.

But back to his story. It begins back on March 3, when the COVID-19 issue wasn’t grabbing many headlines and precautions weren’t even considered.

Bob was in Chicago for his birthday and visited a nightspot where it was shoulder-to-shoulder with revelers all night.

Now, we need to interject here that at 63, Bob is in great shape. Takes no medications. Has no pre-existing conditions. Works out twice a week. And puts in 60 hours a week at his jobs.

But four days after his Chitown visit, the ominous symptoms began to show up.

“It started with a severe headache like I’ve never experienced before,” he said, recalling that it started at the base of his skull and worked its way forward.

Then came the coughing and the inevitable body aches.

“I just didn’t feel up to snuff,” he understated.

It grew worse by day. He got so weak he couldn’t walk from his living room to the kitchen without stopping to rest. Then came sweats and chills and a lot of trouble sleeping.

Bob called the doctor, who advised that he likely had COVID-19 but there was no need to go to the hospital.

“No one knew,” he said, “so they basically said ‘you have to stick it out.’”

He did that, but not without paying the price.

Bob slept with his clothes on for several days, fearing he was going to wake up in the middle of the night and need to call 911.

He even wrote out his will because frankly, he thought he might die.

He experienced chest pains as well, although “never enough to think I was having a heart attack,” Bob said.

On about the third or fourth day, he said he started having hallucinations and his vision started to go. It became blurry and he said he would see moving figures in his peripherals.

“I also had a fever and would literally cough until I vomited,” he shared (thanks for that, by the way).”It was the worst sickness I’ve ever had.”

He further described it as “2-1/2 weeks of hell and another week of slow recovery.”

He vividly recalls the day COVID left his body.

Our friend was watching TV that afternoon and when he put his head down, his body started trembling almost uncontrollably.

“It felt like a trance,” he said, “although I never lost consciousness. It seemed like about five minutes had passed but when I looked up, it was an hour and a half.

“That’s when I felt that COVID left my body. I could feel that the fever broke at that point.”

And since that time?

Bob says five months later now, his vision is not yet completely restored and he has tingling in his extremities sometimes, which are “the persistent symptoms that follow me,” he said.

Through it all, he remains “overwhelmed by the commitment of family and friends” who brought him food (always social distancing by leaving it on the porch) and sent him money.

“I was unemployed for three months,” Bob related. “I saw the good nature in people.”

Along with the bad in nearly being down for the count.

“I’m a busy, busy guy,” he offered, “and it completely shut me down.”

Not enough, however, to steal the sentimentality from him.

“The hardest thing in all this,” he confided, “is that I haven’t hugged my mother since March 7. She’s 88 and we’re a hugging family.”

He leaves us with this sobering thought: ...

“If I can get it, you can get it.”