L.V. – Arizona
Describe the symptoms and the timeline of the reaction.
"8/23/21
In the spring of 2020 I developed a post viral syndrome (possibly covid but we don’t know), and my legs went numb, my hands were shaking and I had brain fog, irritability and trouble walking. We didn’t really know about long haul covid then. My blood pressure started spiking in weird ways and I felt breathless at times. I immediately improved my diet and made a doctors appointment. By the time I was able to get a blood test I had a negative ANA and was given a referral to neurology. In September the neurologist did a nerve conduction study, and nothing was wrong, so ms was ruled out, and I was baffled. I started to improve a bit and received the first Pfizer shot in March of 2021, and felt almost normal again. But two days after the second shot in early April my lymph nodes blew up and I was debilitated by fatigue which five months later has not let up. My thyroid numbers went into bizarre territory (they’ve normalized now) and my cholesterol soared. I’ve had odd rashes, bumps in my mouth, extreme muscle weakness where I couldn’t even hold up a coffee cup. I went back to the medical center and had an ultrasound which showed shotty lymph nodes. I had a normal mri scan. MRIs in neck and shoulders show spondylitis. I now have a positive ANA for the first time in my life, with a positive dsdna reading—not severe, but apparently the labs lag behind symptoms for lupus. It takes so long to see another neurologist or rheumatologist that I have been unable to get treatment except through a naturopath. Other symptoms include severe jaw pain, joint pain with arthritis in my neck and arms (didn’t have before shot), irregular heartbeats, sleep difficulty, light sensitivity, blurred vision and constant headaches, especially at night. I still have to get through more tests but no one seems to be willing to discuss the vaccine’s role in this. Some of it likely existed before, but the fatigue, the ana numbers headaches and shoulder pain near the shot and rashes are all new. I can’t do the things I enjoy and have maybe an hour or two in the morning where I can function before I crash from fatigue. My husband is kind and picks up a lot of slack, but this has been hard on us. My memory and brain fog are terrible. I am pro science, and I don’t discourage people from vaccinations, but I really long to have some honest, transparent and rational conversations about this without being labeled as a conspiracy theorist.
-L.V. - Arizona
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