A very bad cold or flu can totally damage your body and is how lots of older folks go unfortunately.

That was my view of COVID at the early stages of the pandemic. A lot of people were saying that it's just a bad flu. I thought it being a bad flu is terrifying.

An even so, having caught the damn thing three times now even through vaccines, I think my view back then was overly optimistic.

I got it before the pandemic shut down. in February of 2020. I was working in a high contact environment with high risk. I ended up sick, then sicker, then my whole team was sick, and out of work. we were told to do training as wfh and we'd be back when we felt better. it felt like that wasn't coming. I got sicker and bedridden, my dr prescribed a steroid inhaler and wasn't sure what it was. then sent out some labs and said 'inconclusive'. i stayed sick. moving from the bed into the attached bathroom and back was a 4 steo with breaks sitting on the floor process. i lost my job. i went on unemployment. it was another half of a month before I went back to the doctor. Covid. and they had no options for me but to wait it out. it wasnt bad enough.

I got walking pneumonia last year. Took some antibiotics and got rid of it, but it basically brought back my childhood asthma. I’ve been stuck with it for about 10 months now. Really eye opening to me how long it has lasted.

They are seeing all these mass deaths. According to the antivaxx crowd almost every single person who gets sick or dies could have prevented this by not getting vaxxed. They don't care, that this is absolute bullshit.

These people are addicted to this feeling that they have discovered some secret that destroys conventional wisdom and sheds a whole new light on everything. They are addicted to this feeling that they’ve found a big lie everyone’s swallowed and they’re going to spit it out.

Every part of their worldview has to have that quality or they can’t hold onto it with their brains. There’s a great deal of straightforward, plain-as-day information that’s totally missing from their worldview because it doesn’t contain the drug their brain is addicted to.

conveniently silent

Always. When the previous conspiracy theory / rapture date / return of JFK / illuminati plot doesn't turn out to be true, there's no talking about it or self reflection, it's just right onto the next conspiracy theory / rapture date / return of JFK / illuminati plot.

It sucks but the recovery is still possible. I imagine gaslighting and not taking it seriously by people is debilitating.

When you suffer a brain injury from a stroke everyone will be supportive and offer help but when it is long covid people will be like “what? you are probably imagining things” both aliments are recoverable but it must suck to be constantly denied and not treated seriously

That makes 2 of us. Been living with brain fog, memory loss, inability to pick out words when speaking, and now I set something down on a countertop, turn around, turn back and look and I literally can't see the item I set there. I see everything else, even the countertop where the item is sitting. Generally I either panic or I get pissed at myself for being so stupid. And then all of a sudden, the item magically returns to view as a stare at it.

Oh, and just for fun, breathing is still hard. And all medical testing shows my lungs are just fine and there should be problem. My pulmonologist tells me I'm one of the lucky few to be so chosen-- in jest. (I had to search "lung doctor" because I couldn't remember the word pulmonologist just now)

You're fine, it's anecdotal but perspectives are still nice to see sometimes. Quite a few people around me had the same issue, a few died. (Yes, they had refused the vaccine)

I went looking for data, because my knee-jerk was to assume people who get vaccinated are more likely to live, and thus more likely to get long covid.

But here's what I found. The researchers found that the rate of new Long COVID cases declined with each variant, and that the numbers of cases were significantly lower in the vaccinated cohorts.

I'm just adding to the discourse.

COVID makes you dumber, but what happens if you start out dumb?

The biggest problem with social media is that it united the village idiots like your pal. Now, instead of being fringe, they find like minded dipshits online who reinforce their belief while also feeding them new, insane, ideas. I don't know where it's leading us to, but so far it ain't good.