Throughout this entire pandemic period I’d managed to avoid catching covid, primarily by wearing a mask anytime I’m in an indoor public space. I’ve also had five covid vaccinations, in addition to my usual flu shot, because I’ve already been on a ventilator three times in my life due to fairly severe asthma. No allergies, not stress-induced, it’s asthma that mostly kicks in when I’m ill or exercising really hard.
As you can guess, having already been on a vent’ several times I have absolutely no desire to go through that ordeal ever again! Compared to being intubated and having a machine breathing for me, wearing a mask is barely even an inconvenience.
Ten days ago, though, I took off my KN95 mask for just a moment in a crowded public space… and caught covid – of course. It was at the Gala Art Awards ceremony for the 36th edition of the annual City of Montréal art contest, named the “Pierrefonds-Roxboro Art Contest” for the neighborhood in which this event originated. (1)
The Gala was held the evening of Friday December 2, and I was called up onstage to be presented with an award; one of my watercolour paintings had won First Prize, in the Amateur artist category “Watercolour & Gouache” paintings. Once onstage, the event photographer and several of the organizers and City dignitaries encouraged me to remove my mask for a quick photo with the City Councilor who was presenting me with a framed award certificate.
I was both honoured and surprised to have won this award, for several reasons which you can read about here. Particularly because I’m a new or emerging artist who only began learning to paint and to draw last year!
As that moment at the awards ceremony was the only time I’ve been out in public without a mask, in ages, I can be fairly certain that this is where I picked up the virus. I woke at 0400 the following Monday morning with a bad cough, and then tested positive for covid with an at-home test I’d picked up a while ago from our local pharmacy.
Because of my relatively new rare autoimmune and neuro-inflammatory disease, on top of asthma severe enough to put me on a vent’ several times, I was already worried about the effects of covid when coughing woke me up at 0400. As the hours went by, I began wheezing with every cough – that’s never a good sign when you live with asthma. As the name of my rare disease (Complex Regional Pain Syndrome or CRPS) implies, it causes severe neuropathic or nerve pain; it also causes a long list of other symptoms that might cause me to have a worse reaction to covid than healthy people.
My pharmacy opens at 0900, so by 0915 I was on the phone with someone there. The pharmacy assistant who took my call explained that there might be a medication that I could take, but that the pharmacist would have to call me back – within an hour. Just a few moments later the pharmacist called me back herself, and went over my file and medications with me on the phone.
She asked about my rare disease, my asthma, and said that a medication called Paxlovid might help prevent my respiratory symptoms from overwhelming my asthma. She would need, she told me, to check on my lab tests for kidney and liver function, and then call me back.
Again, within just a few moments, the pharmacist had called me back. By now it was about 1000 in the morning. She told me that she was able to issue Paxlovid to me, without a physician’s prescription, and that this would be at no charge to me. The charges for this medication, along with the consultation and the delivery, would be sent directly to our provincial government.
Under Canada’s publicly-funded hospital systems, it’s in each provincial or territorial government’s best interests to keep patient out of hospitals that are already stretched far beyond their breaking points. This is something of which I’m keenly aware, due to to my own background in bioethics and healthcare; the career I loved and that was stolen from my by a CRPS-related ‘mild cognitive impairment’ that arose at the end of 2018.
By 1030 that morning, with the pharmacy having only opened at 0900, I had already received a delivery of Paxlovid – so that I could start right away with the morning dose instead of waiting eight hours for the dinnertime dose. For anyone familiar with healthcare in Canada, that was a phenomenally rapid response to a patient request.
I can’t tell whether it was the effect of my fifth covid vaccination, or the Paxlovid, but my cough went away very quickly – along with my cough-induced wheezing. That was a relief! I never developed a fever, nor any of the aching bones and joints, chills, headache, and other symptoms that a fever causes.
My only real symptom, after starting the Paxlovid, was extreme fatigue – worse than the everyday fatigue caused by the autoimmune facet of my rare disease. I’m hoping that will go away soon, so that I can get back to my watercolour painting.
Winning this award for one of my paintings had really sparked my desire to get back to my easel – to finish several paintings that I haven’t yet had time to finish, and to start several new ones that I’ve been almost dreaming about… But I’m still getting dizzy if I even stand for too long, so my easel will have to wait another day or so.
In the meantime, I’ve learned my lesson; I’ll be keeping my mask on, from now on! Even for “photo ops” with local dignitaries. At least there was two bits of silver lining in this story. One was that I had already sealed al the holiday cards and gifts that we had to mail before going to that awards ceremony. The second was that I was able to make it to the companion art exhibition the weekend after the awards ceremony, before I had any symptoms, to get some photos of this art show in daylight. (2)
As always, thanks so much for stopping by. I’d love to hear from you, but had to disable the Comments feature here on the blog after it became too much for me to manage with my CRPS-related ‘mild cognitive impairment’. Please drop a comment over on my Twitter (@SandraWoodsMtl) or Instagram (@sandrawoods_creative_arts) pages.
Take care, keep well, and look after yourself. As we come up to the holiday season, I’ll wish you a peaceful, restful, and comforting holiday period; this is a difficult time for many people, so I tend to avoid wishing “happy holidays” to everyone.
References
(1) Ville de Montréal (City of Montréal). Winning artworks from the 36th edition of Pierrefonds-Roxboro’s Art Competition. Municipal government website (Home: Articles: Attractions). Updated 10 Dec 2022. Accessed 10 Dec 2022:
https://montreal.ca/en/articles/winning-artworks-36th-edition-pierrefonds-roxboros-art-competition-41349?fbclid=IwAR1DVEFbTMNvYt-VqyHggVRMokfG7GUBHVv6o0HXu2iePAvL_nbapvhLHzE
(2) Sandra Woods. A visit to the Art Contest exhibition, at the Pierrefonds Library. Website. 04 Dec 2022. Accessed 10 Dec 2022:
https://www.sandrawoods.art/blog/a_visit_to_the_art_contest_exhibition_at_the_pierrefonds_library