Sindhu

Age at interview: 40

Brief Outline:

Gender: Female
Ethnicity: Indian
Background: Sindhu is 40 years old and is Indian. She is married with two children and works as an accountant. Sindhu’s sense of smell and taste changed when she had Covid. She says that even now, some foods do not taste the same as they did before she had Covi

 

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When the pandemic first started, Sindhu was worried about how it would impact her personally. She thought that she was more likely to experience Covid because she has had part of her lung removed, and her husband works in medicine so was more likely to be around patients with Covid.
 
Shortly after Sindhu’s husband had his first Covid vaccine he started to come down with a fever and back pain. At the time, Sindhu put it down to him working too hard. Shortly after Sindhu started to feel really tired, but did not have any other symptoms of Covid. However, her husband suggested that she do a Covid test. When they called 111 to request  tests they were told that they could not be tested because they had none of the officially-recognised three main symptoms of Covid. A few days later Sindhu started to have chest pain, so her husband rang 111 and again they said that Sindhu could not be tested because her symptoms did not suggest Covid. When Sindhu’s condition got worse and her husband rang again, her husband lied and said that she also had a fever and cough just so she could be tested. The test came back positive for Covid, and her son also tested positive.
 
Sindhu says that one of her more extreme symtpoms was change of smell and taste. She explains, “I could not smell bananas or oranges, it was not like I lost it [my smell], everything was so enhanced.” She says because of changes in her smell and taste she could not eat and had to eat very basic and tasteless foods. Even now, Sindhu says that she is a “little bit off food.”

 

Sindhu worried about her children not seeing their friends during the pandemic.

You know having the kids stay at home they need I think you think about unfairness of it. You know they’re at home, they can’t see their friends they are… I am not about the education bit of it, part of it at all, they are kids. At least that’s my take on it. They are sponges, they will just take it up. Well the whole world is going through it. So I am not worried or tense about how it’s going to affect their education but I am more worried about that they don’t see their friends, you know they need that kind of you know social interaction.

Sindhu was feeling really tired but thought it was because of being busy and her worries about the pandemic.

By the beginning of Feb I didn’t, I didn’t have any fever, I didn’t have any cough I didn’t have any general symptoms of Covid, absolutely nothing but I was feeling really, really tired and you get this fluey feeling. You don’t have any fever or I don’t, I didn’t have any fever but I had a really bad fluey feeling but I thought because a year end is approaching and I had always working it’s being at home and he is so hard working and all that, I thought it was just a general and you know you don’t feel good anyway about you know sitting at home, you are not meeting anybody, my family is in India and it’s like so worrying anyway because you know numbers are going up there so I just put it down to the general I’m not feeling great because I’m not going out or whatever and then all of that for five days was that I was feeling really tired. Then by Thursday I felt, I felt that something was not right, and I told my husband something was not right, and he said that why don’t we do, you know, a Covid test because he was not feeling great. A couple of his colleagues had Covid.

Sindhu was relieved when she got a positive result because it explained why she was feeling so tired

And when the test came back positive for you how did you feel… seeing it there?

I think, I was relieved to be honest with you. I know that, ok that is the reason I was feeling tired… You know, you know it’s almost like an uncertainty in the, why is this? And oh now I know this is Covid. You know and I was not feeling really tired, I was just feeling a little bit tired in the first week but then I thought oh that’s how it’s going to be for me and that’s when it properly hit me, that’s different. In that first full week I was still working through it. Everything was… I was feeling tired but I’m, I’m ok but I didn’t know what is making me tired. But when the test came back positive oh, that’s the reason why. So it’s like ok, that’s good.

Sindhu was conscious of her manager’s continued support despite a busy period at work.

I am still taking it easy you know one day if I feel tired I am telling my manager, not feeling great today you know can I just take a half day off and he says yeah that’s absolutely fine. So, they are very, very supportive and because the year end is really busy as well, but they are very supportive. And if I want to take a break I just tell them no today is not my day just wanna take a break not because of my anxiety or anything but because I am generally feeling tired. You know some day maybe I have a late night and I don’t sleep well at night because I can’t properly lie down and sleep um you know so I do take breaks. I don’t think it has anything to do with work because in work I am not stressed out at all even though it is the year end because I know how supportive they are.

Sindhu struggled to cope with the anxiety she developed while having Covid.

I was so tired. Absolute tired. Then I think after my first one week it was just tiredness. Then I think by second week the tiredness started reducing. I was still tired but I was not sleeping constantly. But I don’t know if it’s like…I am generally not a very nervous person you know I have always read the books about this anxiety attacks and all that. I’m, I am not a person like that at all you know. I am generally a calm controlled and I know what’s going on I think. I’m sure other people are like that as well. I think the second week I could feel that I was getting anxiety attacks. But I could not put it down why. So you know you think about logically, you know husband at home, kids are fine, we don’t have any job insecurities, my work was really supportive they said you can come back any time you want, there is no pressure of working at all so they are very supportive. So you think about it logically there is nothing that makes me nervous and I almost recovered from it because my tiredness was going away. I had no fever, no classic symptoms so you think of the head there is no reason to be anxious but I was getting anxiety attacks at night.
 
And generally I am not that kind of a person, I have never had that. So I even, this was my husband asking you know, I can’t figure out or what is happening because that’s not who I am. I don’t know if it made any sense and he said maybe it is just you sitting at home, general stuff and ah I don’t know there are some studies saying that it could be just your, you know Covid is affecting the brain and you know. And I think maybe being a rational or you know you think about logically, I can think logically because for reasons I think of it like a flu and I could not figure out why it was affecting my brain you know. I don’t, I think my thinking capacity reduced a little bit but not to that extra you know I forget stuff, nothing like that. Just the general tiredness but more than general tiredness and anxiety attacks I was worrying. I think at night I will hold my husband’s hand very, very tightly at night and the thing is I could not place why I was doing that because nothing was worrying me. You know things like that, I think one morning he woke up with his arm fully bruised. Seems like I scratched him at night [laughs]!