Happy new year! Here's some COVID

If you like to teeter on the edge of health/solvency and sickness/debt, boy is this the season for you!

Welcome to The Tonic, a light-hearted, heavily-resourced newsletter for folks interested in learning about long COVID, ME/CFS, and other chronic illnesses. Come for the info; stay for the whimsy. Or vice versa.

If you’re new here, you should know that my posting schedule is generally once a week on Saturdays or Sundays, and I alternate between a narrative post and a roundup post, so as to get more resources out to you and also to manage my own energy levels (often referred to as spoons). Occasionally I post more than once a week, usually to announce an event or to push brief, timely info out to you sooner.

However…

I have had to admit defeat to that rascally scoundrel that just lives to overwhelm us all, a.k.a. the month of December, so I’ll be taking a hiatus on my longer narrative posts until the new year. Today’s post is a bit of a light-lift hybrid: a little bit of narrative and a lot of resources.

Wish list shout outs!

I’ve frankly been a little overwhelmed by the support that came my way this week! So many of you have chosen to support my efforts here via the Amazon wish list in lieu of paid subscriptions (which could jeopardize my disability benefits). A giant Tonic THANK YOU this week goes to Rachel H., Roger N., and Jenny D. for your generous gifts!

And…we had another mystery donor (no note in the package). If you gifted me a tub of face cream, please do let me know! My wrinkles and pores want to thank you 😊

If you want to show your support, see below for details. There’s something on the list for every budget, and anything you send will be very much appreciated.

The Tonic is free to read - Amy is so happy you’re here! There is no paid subscription option here like with other Substack newsletters. However, if you are valuing the experience and are able, please consider a show of support by sending a gift of health, wellness, or joy from this Amazon wish list. Anyone who does gets a 📢 in an upcoming post. Thank you!

Now, let’s get down to biz.

As we ring in the new year…it’s COVIDing again

Sure, we made merry, but I can’t be the only one who feels like I either know or have heard about dozens of peeps who have recently had or who currently have COVID. It’s running rampant right now, at least here in the U.S.

Some are NOVIDs who lost their ne’er-had status; others are repeat infectees (yes, I made up a word).

Every one of my readers needs to hear these words of David Putrino’s, Mt. Sinai’s director of their post-COVID center and one of the pre-eminent long COVID researchers. It’s just over a minute long; stay strong, you can do it.

“Every single person who gets COVID is at risk of developing Long COVID. This is something that I can’t stress enough.”

Being vaccinated or having fought off COVID before may only somewhat reduce your risk. But aside from developing Long COVID, there is long-term damage that the virus can still cause.

A paper published in Nature Medicine in the fall of 2022 showed that people with two or more Covid infections were more than three times as likely to develop lung and heart issues, and over 1.5 times as likely to have a neurological disorder, including brain fog and strokes, than those who were only infected once. And Dr. Marc Sala, co-director of the Northwestern Medicine Comprehensive COVID-19 Center, told the New York Times that he frequently sees patients who were more or less fine after their first couple of infections wind up with long Covid in the wake of a third or fourth infection.

I came across the above video clip of Putrino while reading the article below, graciously shared with me by my fellow ‘stacker

Leanne Shawler

(thanks, Leanne!). This article is making the rounds big time in the Long COVIDsphere and is such an important one, I’ve elevated it from The After-party to the main body of this post. Check it out:

Long COVID will take your health, your wealth — then it will come for your marriage

The bottom line here for all of my readers is: take this shit seriously. AVOID REINFECTION.

Would you really want to risk developing a disease that can take your health, wealth (such that it is - and it can always be worse), or your relationships?

You’re tired of testing. You’re tired of masking. You’re tired of isolating.

I get it. It’s inconvenient. It’s not fun.

Let’s compare lists though. Here’s what I’m tired of:

• Fatigue that feels like my body is made of concrete.

• Crashing after being on the computer for too long (30 minutes).

• The cold/wet/numb feeling on the skin of my arms and legs (neuropathy).

• The tachycardia I get from taking out the compost or scooping the litter boxes.

• The purple splotches I’ve had under my fingernails for 3.5 years.

• A brain that sometimes decides to forget things I was recently told or that sometimes can’t process information quickly.

• Feeling like I might collapse when there are too many conversations going on at once, or the music is too loud, or all of that is happening at once.

• Not being able to work (see above bullet points).

• Going from being consumer debt-free to the dancing-on-hot-coals I’ve had to do to move our rising five-figure debt to the next zero or low-interest credit card.

• My shrinking friend pool, because I am only willing to gather in public on weekday afternoons at off-peak restaurant/coffee shop hours.

There’s more, but you catch my drift. All this, courtesy of my first and only COVID infection almost four years ago. I am not trying to catch this virus again. I have made some small gains and have no interest in going backward.

All that said

I want to give a huge, sloppy Tonic kiss to my (little) big sister Diana, who has not only been my champion throughout this illness (well, my whole life, really) but also my protector. She has asked everyone coming to holiday festivities at her house for the past three years to take a COVID test before coming or to wear a mask. Everyone has opted to test, and we have all avoided getting each other sick over Thanksgiving and Christmas. We should really be a case study in how to holiday right. Thank you also to my family and extended family for all caring enough to take the damn tests. Much love to Diana and to all of you 💞

she is beautiful inside and out, and she busts her adorable lil ass for us every holiday

Stick around for some epic links….

🥳 The After-party 🥳

Announcements, links to articles and studies, recommendations and shout-outs, and miscellany joy and/or tomfoolery.

🔥 Suffering from a post-holiday symptom flare? Raelan Agle here with some helpful tips.

🧘🏻 A new study shows that the relaxation response can reduce utilization of healthcare by up to an astonishing 43%. Meditation, yoga, and prayer were all cited as effective ways to induce the relaxation response. Read more here in The Harvard Gazette.

⚡Cort Johnson of Health Rising once again bringing us the latest in ME/CFS and long COVID research news: The Itaconate Shunt Hypothesis – Could it Explain the Energy Problems and PEM in ME/CFS? (PEM = post-exertional malaise, defined by MEpedia as a worsening of ME/CFS symptoms and/or the appearance of new symptoms after physical or cognitive exertion which was previously tolerated, and is often delayed 24-72 hours or more).

📃 Here’s one from

Kirsten Powers

that really spoke to me:

Living in ‘survival mode’ causes chronic illness, and may even kill you.

👩🏽‍🎨 A medical student was isolated by an autoimmune disorder. Poetry was a way out.

🏃🏼‍♀️ Say what you will about her music (I’m not the biggest fan), you’ve gotta hand it to T. Swift for living up to her last name: I’m an Ultrarunner. Taylor Swift’s Treadmill Workout Wrecked Me.

🤦🏽‍♂️ Buffoon of the week: This one was a little too easy. Presidential hopeful Nikki Haley for the win here. Watch as she works so hard not to say the word ‘slavery’ that her head almost pops right off her neck. Can’t risk offending her Confederate…no, insurrectionist…no, base of voters across the land, can she?

🏆 Winner of the week: the state of California, for becoming the first to offer health insurance to all undocumented immigrants. Whatever your stance is on immigration, we should all be pro-healthcare-as-basic-human-right. It’s good for the people who can access it and it’s good for the rest of us too, as it means lower rates of communicable disease and lowered costs when folks can access primary care over emergency care.

🐈‍⬛ 💩 And finally, it’s this week’s Cat Dump. Holiday with a touch of Dog Dump 🐶💩 (my sister’s fam’s pups).

1. Lenny and his one blue eye, 2. Millie and her one blue eye, 3. awesome wood plaques of our indoor kitties, made by my uber-talented sibkid Valley. From l to r: Fritzy, Birdie, and Zira, with Speck on top (RIP, little baby), 4. indoor kitties looking drunk...they've been hanging out near each other much more lately.

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**Disclaimer: I am (clearly) not a licensed medical professional. You should not rely on any information contained in this newsletter in making medical, health-related or other decisions. Please consult a doctor or other health professional.