Covid Limbo

Nearly 70,000 cases of covid infection were reported yesterday, 8th January. Of course that’s officially confirmed cases and the real number of infections will be much higher. A small but significant proportion of those people will go on to be hospitalised and a small but significant proportion of them will die in the next few days. As we are often reminded, as if to reassure us, most of these victims will be over 60 and/or have various ‘underlying medical conditions’, but there are at least a couple of important ways in which this narrative of reassurance is both troubling and misleading. First, this narrative, intentionally or not (and I think it often is intentional when seized upon by various covid deniers and ‘lockdown sceptics’) effectively relegates people over 60 and those with ‘underlying conditions’ (and the list of these conditions is much more extensive than people normally realise) to more or less sub-human status: those whose deaths and lives are apparently relatively unimportant. Secondly, the fact is that you just don’t know if you are ‘vulnerable’ or not to this virus – no one can be sure that they are ‘safe’ from it. Indeed it’s currently thought that one in 20 people who develop symptoms on infection might suffer symptoms lasting more than eight weeks and, further, a significant number of those people remain unwell for several months (at least) after infection. This isn’t ‘just’ elderly people or those with ‘pre-existing health conditions’, but includes relatively young, relatively fit and active people like me – I’m 45 and before I became very ill with long covid last summer I used to weight-train in a serious and focused way at least 3 to 4 times a week. There are many, many people in more or less the same position as me currently and, given the rates of infection at the moment, many more will find themselves in a similar place over the next few weeks and months. Those who think – selfishly and incorrectly – that the pandemic is of little concern to them personally really ought to think again.--Ed Rooksby, January 9, 2021 "Nine months in the long limbo of long covid." [HT Chris Brooke]

Last week, I was too depressed to pen a digression. This despite the fact that my very kind and supportive, university's occupational physician suggested that a diary in which I record my progress might be helpful. And there is progress to report: Saturday, nine days ago, was the last truly horrid day of intense headaches. Since, I have barely had any dizziness (the most recurring symptom), much more manageable bouts of insomnia, and much reduced spells of headaches. In addition, on several days I lacked the general sense of fatigue I have tried to describe before (recall here; here; here). In the post quoted at the top of my own, Rooksby, whose symptoms were considerably worse than my own, writes, "it felt like my brain was encased in cotton wool and that I was somehow removed from reality, like I was watching everything – including my own activity – from behind thick glass."  

Even so, even minor walks or an hour responding to emails can still induce a strange fatigue and irritability toward any kind of noise or disturbance (which helps me recognize the fatigue). And the depression was caused not just by my ongoing inability to read books, but also a sense that every sign of progress is quickly followed by a rude reminder that I am nowhere near recovered. Part of me wonders if the sense of despair isn't itself a by-product of covid given how many other weird (and mostly minor) intermittent neurological/cognitive symptoms I experience.

The university's occupational physician convinced me that I need to take my sick leave seriously. And so I have let go of most of my work related activities. As I decline requests to do tenure files, referee, blurb; postpone research activities related to a number of edited volumes and grants; postpone or cancel public lectures and interviews; withdraw from dissertation defenses; I accept intra-departmental political defeats, and I also register how much stuff I pack into my ordinary self days. 

Perhaps the depression was induced by the following uncanny experience. I watched myself lecture on video last week. The recording of the lecture series is used to substitute for my presence this semester. It's a huge lecture course (400-500 students). And while I am no Sandel, I enjoy and take pride in, allowing my lectures to be interrupted by Q&A throughout.  In watching myself -- and my ridiculously chaotic slides -- I realized that I was not so much explaining the material, but sharing what I found interesting or exciting and tried to explain the grounds of interest, while smuggling in concepts and arguments I am supposed to expose them to. I took a childish pleasure into watching myself lecture.

But my responses to student questions were different altogether. I suddenly realized, as I was watching the recording, that I often had no idea what I would answer then, or could answer now, and I would marvel at how my recorded self would quickly and sometimes humorously manage to process and incorporate the questions into the lecture. He could think much faster, much subtler than I can now!* 

When I mentioned this to the university's occupational physician, she laughed a bit. And said that I should not underestimate the skill with which I could handle complex thought when I was not incapacitated. I did not put quote marks around that because I don't recall the exact wording, but that's because she did use 'incapacitated' (in Dutch: arbeidsongeschikt). 

Rooksby (an accomplished blogger and writer), who I knew from a far distance, seems to have died yesterday (here). And that gives his words a special poignance. It's interesting to me that he has tracked the social implicature of 'underlying conditions' as sub-human-status. Back in the day (March 2020), I registered 'herd-immunity' as code for 'culling' or 'dispensable.' And I even satirized that our pseudo-Darwinian age would be followed by a religious revival that would refer to our era as the 'great culling.' When I feel a bit stronger, I want to collect my thoughts on being an incapacitated, philosopher. 

But I am lucky that I don't feel a stigma that I am incapacitated for work; and grateful for hard-earned victories of earlier generations, that I can draw a salary while being pampered at home by my very busy, hardworking spouse. I do find it frustrating and embarrassing that my already overworked and more junior colleagues have additional work because of my disease. The Dutch government has opened the purse-strings, but not for our underfunded universities. I know better, but can't shake the thought am letting down those that count on my help in their career/professional advancement.

Even so, I spent most of my days watching netflix and daydreaming about invited research leaves in lovely climes. With gradual recovery I am willing to hope that I will be able to read and teach again...although last week I could not quiet altogether my simmering panic I may not. When I was a teenager I saw a documentary about Willem de Kooning's late art, which was so much sparser than his exuberant and overflowing earlier work. Later I learned that he suffered from Alzheimer's. I wonder if my post-covid work will have such clean and elegiac quality.

 

 

 

*Sometimes, when I used to give a department-talk to an especially impressive group, I notice in Q&A that my audience can think quicker than I can. And I think of that as being rusty; but usually by the end of Q&A I have caught up.

Comments

[George Gale]

I am relieved to hear that your physician convinced you to take your sick leave seriously. Debbie, who used to be an RN before she got her PhD at Pitt, finally convinced me two weeks ago that "you've been *sick* no matter what you think, and you need to HEAL: slow down and heal." Excellent advice for both of us.
I'm glad to hear you're improving Eric, albeit slowly. We need you back in the lists! You go, boy!

[dmf]

good news about the relief of some symptoms and that you are open to care from folks in the know, "depression" is tricky how to sort out feeling ill/off, sadness, anger, pain, mourning, learned-helplessness, alienation, etc? I used to try and tell folks in disability studies that they should make the strategic/political move of aligning themselves with folks working on geriatric issues, sooner of later the breakdowns are coming to all...

[Bill Wimsatt]

Eric, I read this only now but rejoice with all at your partial improvements. When you feel frustrations at your remaining limitations, realize that you do better philosophy limited to blog posts than most of us unhindered. I really appreciated your reflections on regrets. In the meantime, rejoice in your wife, son, and mother! Love from both of us! Bill and Barb for a speedy and sustained recovery.