Covid Diaries

Last night when I returned home from work, I was feeling feverish I thought it might be due to exertion but for precaution I kept myself locked in my room. Being a medical professional I have lots of friends and acquaintances in medical practice. Various thoughts were creeping in my mind among which the most impulsive thought was of being caught by covid. We were playing I spy with each other since the very first day of lockdown. It took 7 months for covid to catch me. In these thoughts, I called one of my doctor friends to clear my doubt as my primary concern was my elderly parents with whom I was living. The doctor who is my childhood friend enquired about signs symptoms and other details for a long time and at last, he draws the conclusion that I am suffering from covid. I was in complete shock, my mind was blank, the first thought that came to my mind was how to protect my parents from this disease. My doctor friend was trying to console me, my mind was giving excuses that I don't have any symptoms, my friend's diagnosis is wrong. How can I have covid when I had not met any unknown person? Blah blah blah. Somehow I spent that night by strictly instructing mom not to enter my room nor to touch the things I used. Convincing myself that in covid people lost smell and taste and have dry cough etc which are not present in me I called my friend who is a government pharmacist and serving as a corona warrior, I told him the entire story, he suggested " baba why don't you come for the test? It will be clear your doubt and it is good from a security point of view of your parents ." I agreed with him and decided to go for a covid test, my heart was kept telling my mind that I don't have covid as I can smell and taste. On the way to the test, I took chewing gums to check whether I can taste or not and I found them sweeter than before. I told my pharmacist friend that I can taste sweetness. He assured me that if I can taste and smell might be I don't have covid.

Finally, I reached on the venue of the test, my friend had already generated the code by my adhar card, his subordinates were ready in the PPI kit to take Samples. On seeing My first Antigen report his subordinate whispered something in my friend's ear he rushed to see the kit, I can see the bulges on his forehead when he returned, my heart started throbbing enormously. He came and stood by me calmly and said let us do another test as there is some problem in the first antigen test. I had no other option than agreeing, they took another sample, my friend examined it himself and declared that I am positive for corona, my heart shrunk, I felt like my body became lighter, all of sudden I felt like a broken leaf falling from a tree, suddenly two hands came to hold me, it was my friend giving me support to reach up to a place to sit. He was trying to console me, telling the story of how his whole family became corona positive and how they recovered from it, but my mind was numb, I was not in a state of hearing anything, tears were about to come outside, the only thought running in my mind was how to protect my family, I didn't want to put them in stress and under threat of corona, simultaneously I also didn't want the drama of municipal corporation in front of my gate, But it was very late by then. I called home and requested parents to be shifted to the old home immediately in self-isolation. While a return to home my doctor friend was continuously advising me what to do what not to do, on his advice I bought electrolyte supplements from the market in dozens. He was continuously telling me that he had cured many people suffering from covid so I need not worry. I reached home, it was locked parents were gone, I opened the lock with a heart filled with mixed thoughts, just a few hours ago this house was so lively, talks of parents, their laughter, their voices everything was echoing in my mind. I was feeling drained fallen on the bed in the guest room.