Sam Z
Sam is 39 and White British. He lives with friends and works as a freelancer.
Sam was worried about his job during the first UK lockdown. He was aware that work could dry up and that his income could be affected. He caught Covid twice, and the second time his symptoms developed into Long Covid. Sam was interviewed in October 2021.
More about me...
Sam remembers being told to work from home in March 2020 when the pandemic first hit the UK. He remembers being a bit worried that his business would dry up. As he explains, “being a freelancer, of course, I was fully aware that I was on quite thin ice given most companies were looking to make cutbacks.” Sam says these next few months were hard on his mental health. He says he was bored and wanted to return to work.
Sam caught Covid in February 2021. He is unsure how he caught it because he was working from home and rarely going outside. Sam’s only explanation is that he caught it while going to the supermarket or fetching a takeout. Sam says that he did not think he had Covid at first because he only had a fever, and he did not lose his taste or smell. He did not even feel unwell enough to skip work.
After a few days, Sam said he was pressured by his housemate to get a Covid test which came back positive. Sam said he was feeling pretty much ok by this point, but he did lose his taste. He says, “there wasn’t one particular food that was unbearable.” At this point, Sam deliberately rested and started to feel better after two to three weeks. Sam says that he feels that he has fully recovered from Covid. He has reinstated everything he was doing before Covid such as running and playing football.
Sam caught Covid again later that year in the summer. Not realising that he had Covid, he had his second dose of vaccine at the same time. His initial symptoms were similar to the first time he had Covid, but he found that some symptoms persisted for several months. Managing tiredness was a particular challenge. Sometimes he felt his energy levels were so low that it was like being ‘unplugged’. He found that rest and changing his diet helped with managing his fatigue.
See more of Sam’s story.
Sam’s symptoms got worse when he felt stressed. He thought that his physical symptoms made him feel anxious and when he felt anxious about something his physical symptoms could get worse – “it seems like either of them set each other off.”
Sam’s symptoms got worse when he felt stressed. He thought that his physical symptoms made him feel anxious and when he felt anxious about something his physical symptoms could get worse – “it seems like either of them set each other off.”
I think I’ve had my best run of a few days since I’ve been in the sunshine on holiday. I had quite a few days in a row where I’ve just started to feel much brighter in my head, my head felt more switched on and I could feel it in my brain. I felt like I could think better and more clearly.
I mean, I’ve had a couple of, I’ve had a couple of smaller like I felt suddenly just gone and I felt incredibly wiped in bed, and extremely tired…. The Wednesday before I was actually watching a film that had, I’d generally been trying to watch the happy stuff and even if didn't follow it all, where I get tired, the process of information would wear my out.
Simple stuff like that that is quite happy and cheerful and that’s it. But I watched a film that, a gangster film that quite horrific torture scenes in it and watching that, weirdly, it set a bit of my symptoms again. I was really struggling to, the chest tightness of the breathing and I felt dizzy and I wanted to lie down and so, I think, you’ll probably know more about this than me—quite a common theory with this whole is it your…. It actually attacked the whole Long Covid thing, your vagus nerve is just completely out of kilter which connects your mind to your body. When I, you know, having sort of read up, you know, lots of those kind of theories from what look like well trusted sources.
Yeah, it does make sense now that if you’re watching something that’s starting to like make feel a bit uncomfortable and a bit, you know, it’s trigging, you know, it’s sending those kind of messages of blood to your body that’s starting to cause those problems. And even on Monday by my two housemates had just gone, an extremely early pregnancy, the baby has now been an extremely early birth.
So, the baby is now born and healthy. When that was all kicking off on Monday, it was, you know, it was extremely stressful for them as it would be and even kind of being close to that made me feel on the morning that I found out about that, I was just all over the shop. And so, yeah, like even external events that cause any sort of anxiety or stress in my mind can then trigger my body and then it, and then it can be vice versa and sometimes when I, if I’m walking somewhere and again, I always try to take it really slow and really easy. But there are some days when I’m trying to do that and I just feel, you know, if I can feel it start to, I suddenly start to get more exhausted.
And then I think, ‘Oh God, I need to lie down.’ And at that point, I kind of, it almost starts to set off some of the breathing and then that then makes me mentally a bit stressed. It’s so hard to know sometimes where the boundary is between mental anxiety and stress and then the physical stress. It seems like either of them set each other off. So, it’s honestly the most weird, weird, bizarre illness I’ve ever had. Well, I’ve never really had a proper illness like Covid. It’s such a bizarre beast.
Sam felt a huge relief when he found out he had Long Covid rather than cancer or heart disease. This initial reassurance “stabilised his mindset a little bit” but reading about other people’s experience started to “freak him out”.
Sam felt a huge relief when he found out he had Long Covid rather than cancer or heart disease. This initial reassurance “stabilised his mindset a little bit” but reading about other people’s experience started to “freak him out”.
So OK, I then started researching Long Covid. On the notes I was reading other peoples accounts of it and everybody has had this slight, different experience. Some people had different complications and symptoms of varying severity. But there were one or two accounts, that sounded exactly like, I don’t know I think it was from the British Heart Foundation website where one person’s account of it, that almost mirrored mine exactly. In terms of like it might be six weeks after, six weeks after they first caught Covid. That’s when a lot of things started and what they’d also experienced symptoms to similar to mine. So, I was like, okay.
And in some ways that was a huge relief at first, because where earlier that day, I was worried about strokes and heart attacks and all sorts of nasty stuff like that. I’m not saying, Long Covid is pretty damn debilitating and, and yeah, a problem. But there was some big reassurance about just realising, okay, I’ve got this, and I am going to get better at some point. I don’t know how or how long ‘cos it was all just so new to me. But I will recover from this, and then yeah and that was I suppose while I was out there over the next 24 hours that led me into a ton of Google searches, reading other people’s accounts. I didn’t know anyone who had this. I don’t even know where to look and I was in another country. So, I just, I was just trying to read up on it and, it was and then I was put in, one of the accounts I’d read suggested I joined one of these Long Covid support group, which I’ve done through Facebook. And then, again, you know, I went in there and I suppose, at first, it’s just kind of reassuring to know that you’re not the only one going through this and other people are having symptoms like yours.
You know, there’s initial, there’s an initial reassurance and comfort from the fact that OK there are quite a few people going through this that reacting to Covid like this, ok cool. In the short term, that stabilised my mindset a little bit.
But actually, that tires you out like trying to process information and get better and stuff. I reckon it’s tiring just trying to walk and go do your shopping. The mental exhaustion is as debilitating as the physical wear-out that happens. You try and get your head around things and you’re quite tired and it’s a bit harder to process and then also like you just go into the long, you go into the support groups, which I was going to and reading up on different people’s accounts and responses to the questions. And you’ll see questions given by most, the most, certainly I felt a bit stronger and it's just the fatigue like the breathlessness I could sort of get around myself with the breathing exercises.
I spoke to the doctor from the British Heart Foundation and was really helpful and gave me a steer on that stuff. But then yeah, so you’re starting to look at questions on these support groups like, I’m still suffering from the fatigue 12 months in. If anything, it’s actually getting worse. And then, there’ll be like 30 replies saying, yeah, same here, same here. Yeah, 18 months in and still counting. Eleven months in and it’s getting worse. That just starts to freak you out because my natural, I’m an optimist naturally and I just think, alright well, I’m pretty sure I’ll be able to fast get over this, this recovering scale like hopefully six months in are now bish, bash, bosh. I’ll get better. I always do.
You start reading all of this stuff and you’re like, oh my God, what is, what if I never recover.
So many people are just writing, oh my God, I’m really starting to feel that I’m never gonna recover and, and just had a few days where all of that stuff is really starting to bring out of it. I thought, ‘oh my god, what if this is my life now, what if I’m not even able to work again, do the things I love, run, play football.’ And yeah, it’s quite, it is quite a difficult one because there are so many views on how you could or should get better. It’s hard to get your head around. There are all of these like scare stories. Not even just in support groups, by the way.
But if you Google news articles on Long Covid like there was a good one in the financial times generally about what it is and you know, there are resources going into trying to work out how to help people with this stuff. But the examples they feature in there are all kind of the most shocking types. People in their 20s and 30s that were fit and healthy now unable to leave the house. You’re just, you’re surrounded by the virtue of just searching about how to deal with this and you’re just surrounded by all of these scary examples.
And I think, I had started to realise, after a week or so, but I think that in the narrative I was surrounded myself, I intuitively started to feel that okay, I actually need to start surrounding myself with some more positive stories and just creating a more positive narrative for myself around this like, it’s good to understand it, but it’s just making it feel overwhelmed and actually quite down and, I intuitively know that this is not going to help me recover like at all. Like I need that belief and that that positivity and hope.
Sam’s tiredness meant that he could be talking to his friends feeling “almost normal and switched on” to not wanting to talk. He felt “at the mercy of his body” but pushed himself recently to get back to a football match.
Sam’s tiredness meant that he could be talking to his friends feeling “almost normal and switched on” to not wanting to talk. He felt “at the mercy of his body” but pushed himself recently to get back to a football match.
And so, yeah, like even external events that cause any sort of anxiety or stress in my mind can then trigger my body and then it, and then it can be vice versa and sometimes when I, if I’m walking somewhere and again, I always try to take it really slow and really easy. But there are some days when I’m trying to do that and I just feel, you know, if I can feel it start to, I suddenly start to get more exhausted. And then I think, ‘Oh God, I need to lie down.’ And at that point, I kind of, it almost starts to set off some of the breathing and then that then makes me mentally a bit stressed. It’s so hard to know sometimes where the boundary is between mental anxiety and stress and then the physical stress. It seems like either of them set each other off.
So, it’s honestly the most weird, weird, bizarre illness I’ve ever had. Well, I’ve never really had a proper illness like Covid. It’s such a bizarre beast.
On many days, I feel like I’m almost normal like or close to normal. But I still know that I can’t go further than, I can’t, I still just very conscious to not push myself. You can sit talking to your friends and feel almost completely normal and feel switched on. It’s just so bizarre going from being like that to not wanting to talk at all and not being able to move. So, yeah, it’s quite a lot to put your head around. I guess I’m just trying to feel that by keeping a positive enough mindset. I still think it’s important to go see your friends, I don’t go out to like big places or I’m try and see them in the house or go for a short walk.
I make sure that I, I know often when I wake up if it’s gonna be a not so good day like yesterday and Sunday, I knew would not be good days, I just felt quite tired. I am trying to be at the mercy of my body. Always try and be somewhere where I’m capable of lying down, where if I do start to feel tired, I can just give in. I’ve slowly been, most of my days I’ve been doing that like always. Monday was the first time that I would say I’ve pushed myself a tiny bit. I went to go, I haven’t been to a football game in ages, I wanted to go and watch Arsenal. I just wanted to for all sorts of reasons because I haven’t been for a long time and I miss it, and I just wanted something that would be a lift for my mental wellbeing and mood.
I also just wanted to prove almost like I just wanted—there was an element of wanting to prove my independence a touch like to know that I could go somewhere in an environment that perhaps is a bit more busy and uncomfortable than I’ve been in for weeks and not crash. I, I just almost wanted to know that I could get on the Tube, go to football stadium, sit there, watch a game and that I would be fine. I felt pretty bad halfway through. I’m not gonna lie. I wanted to lie down. But obviously, I just sat back down and had some electrolytes and stabilised myself and the only time I wanted to go and lie down in the stadium concourse behind the stand and just like do that again. But I just, by having like mini shutdowns and I just kind of like don’t talk. Try not to engage my brain too much, just like zone out a bit, 10, 15 minutes I find it can just help steading it back down and I felt extremely tired on the way home. I was very, very tired on the Tuesday. But I just and I’m not gonna make a habit of pushing myself like that.