Well, it finally happened. My covid test number 10 came out positive.

It only took almost a year, countless encounters with positive people, getting tested every month since august once or twice, and literally 10 tests, for covid to caught up on me. The timing couldn’t be worse as I just got onto a waiting line for vaccination as a healthcare worker.

Here is how it all went down.

It all happened so fast.

On Monday I started feeling odd. I had a bad sore throat and I was quite tired. But you know, I work at a pharmacy, I talk to people all day long. Of course, I’m tired and my throat hurts from talking too much. Nothing unusual.

I had so many covid scares till now I got so cocky, believing it’s just not gonna happen for me.

I met so many positive people already, spend hours till days with them without getting infected yet.

If it didn’t happen by now, it just ain’t gonna happen.

I’m not doing anything besides working and traveling to and from work. Recently I even skipped shopping for groceries as I order everything online. My social interactions are strictly work and social media.

It’s not like you can do anything else besides that these days as everything is closed anyway. I’m taking vitamins, I’m young and healthy and I’m blindly following all of the precautions, wearing a respirator all the time and my hands are chopped dry from the disinfection. I boldly and naively believed there’s no way I’m gonna catch covid.

So when I woke up Tuesday morning feeling like shit I just blamed it on one of those days. I wasn’t in a mood. Everything irritated me so I guessed I just slept bad. Besides, it got really cold outside in recent days, with lots of snow and frost so I thought I was getting down with a cold.

Over the course of few hours, everything escalated.

My headache worsened, my nasal cavities got so clogged my hearing got weaken. It was like I was underwater and couldn’t hear shit.

I realized something ain’t right and left work early, but not before I bought myself a quick antigen tests for covid we sell at our pharmacy. Don’t know how it works in other countries, don’t ask me, here in Czechia you can buy a antigen covid test in a pharmacy. We’re supposed to sell them to healthcare workers only as they are the only ones that should be performing the tests, but at the same time, we’re not allowed to question whether you’re a healthcare worker or not. So we just assume you are and you can get the test yourself.

The home test consists of the same components as the antigen test at sampling points, which is free here so it’s always better to do an official one rather than testing yourself for the following reasons.

Even as a healthcare worker and even for the fact that I’ve been to tests so many times and I knew what to do and how to do it, doing it yourself is super weird. You have to sick the testing stick up your nose really far to get the proper sample. I kept sneezing all the time. It wasn’t all that bad it just felt super weird and I had no idea if I took the sample correctly.

My home antigen covid test came out negative but my fever started a couple of hours later so now it’s safe to say I fucked it up.

I spend the rest of the day in bed sweating.

I wasn’t so sure about the whole cold thing anymore, but at the same time, I didn’t want to be the patient zero, the one who once again brought covid to our pharmacy. There were very few of us without covid yet left there and we had almost a month without covid. I felt so bad for disturbing everyone’s plans cuz if I was covid positive, they all would have to get tested as well.

But the next morning I woke up coughing and super annoyed and made a reservation for a proper covid test.

Everything was so quick and simple. I went through registration and they asked me if I have any symptoms, which never happened to me before and this was my test number 10, but my first antigen test in Czechia. I always went on PCR which is more reliable but more expensive. This test of mine was free.

The sampling itself was one of the most pleasant ones. The guy performing it was super gentle.

I got a piece of paper with a number and they told me to wait outside. They would call me with my results in 10 minutes.

So I stepped outside and waited.

Meanwhile, I saw people get their results. The healthcare workers would just step out with a piece of paper, shout a number and give the paper to the person. It all took a couple of seconds.

In like 7 minutes they were calling my number. No one was holding any paper and they were holding the door open for me to step back in.

And in that moment I knew I have covid.

Inside they confirmed my suspicion.

The standard procedure here is that if you test positive on an antigen test and you don’t have any symptoms you automatically go to a PCR test free of charge. But since I had a full house of symptoms there was no need to get any more tests.

They were all super lovely and explained everything to me, even showed me my test itself and they were all so sorry I came out positive.

Starting that moment, my 10 days quarantine started.

I contacted my doctor, my colleagues, friends, and family about the shocking covid positive news.

Shortly after I got a call from the hygiene as they need to track my movement to contact people I could have infected myself. But since my life consists of work and Netflix there was nothing much to track.

To answer the most common questions:

Where did I get infected? I could have got it from any patient that came in our pharmacy or I could have got it in a subway. There is no other possibility for me cuz I haven’t been anywhere and I haven’t met anyone new.

How am I feeling? I believe the worst is behind me. I’m still super tired and I sleep most of the day but I’m no longer feverish so it’s all about the small victories.

Do you need any help? As I proper pharmacist I have all of the pills I could possibly need as I’m prepared for every situation possible. In regards to food, I’m a big fan of contactless delivery so I’m all set but I’m so grateful for your concerns. I have so many friends messaging me their offers of help and I’m feeling so grateful and loved.

Can you smell or taste? Yes both, I have all of my senses and even my appetite is the same as before.

What you’re gonna do now? Sleep, chill and watch Netflix.

What surprised me the most about being covid positive is the strange sense of peace that comes with it.

The main goal was to not get covid but, when you do get it, you just know that the worst has happened, the anticipation is gone, you’ll just have to deal with the rest now.

Thank you so much for your lovely messages and concerns.

Stay healthy xo