Experiencing H1N1 flu: personal tales of fatigue, fever, aches
Published Wednesday November 4th, 2009
While thousands of Canadians line up for vaccinations seeking protection against swine flu, countless others across the country have already had their brush with the H1N1 virus. Cases have ranged from mild to so severe that a sick patient can spend weeks in the intensive-care unit of a hospital.
Here are some personal experiences:
Brian Menzies of Victoria can't confirm he had H1N1 but says the flu he apparently contracted from his seven-year-old daughter was worse than any he's had previously. The self-employed public affairs consultant first became ill Thanksgiving Day.
"My daughter had symptoms of the flu as well. She was vomiting," said Menzies. "It didn't take me much longer to feel pretty much the same way.
"It actually hit me pretty quickly. For that first week I had a pretty high fever and loss of appetite, all those sorts of signs, completely different from having a cold."
"I was having difficulty breathing. In fact, I was so surprised how quickly my lungs became very sore. I was having difficulty coughing. It was a dry cough and that sort of thing."
Menzies waited three days to go to the doctor, and only after calling the provincial government's health help line. He went to a nearby walk-in clinic.
"I do have a family doctor, but I felt that it's usually quicker to go into a clinic."
The doctor did not test him for H1N1 and said he did not need to come back.
"I'd asked him to listen to my lungs to make sure I didn't have any fluid in them. I'd had bronchitis previously and my bronchitis seems to have been aggravated."
Menzies said he started to feel better last Monday but is still getting over laryngitis. His daughter was out of school for a week and Menzies says about a third of her Grade 2 class was also ill at one point.
(By Steve Mertl, Vancouver)
*****
For weeks, Brendan Boyd thought he had a simple fall cold.
The 17-year-old from Nova Scotia had just returned to high school in Cole Harbour and chalked up persistent congestion, a headache and general fatigue to the rigours of getting back to class.
He didn't let the lingering symptoms slow him down too much as he continued working two jobs, going to school and hanging out with his girlfriend.
But when he developed a fever and became so dizzy on Oct. 20 that he fell over at work, he and his mother decided it was time to see the doctor.
"It was pretty bad that day," he said from his home, where the whole family has been quarantined.
"I had a fever of 102 and was so tired I slept for 14 hours."
Boyd was tested for H1N1 soon after he collapsed. The next day, the family doctor called to let them know the result came back positive for the virus.
Boyd said he was given medications and quickly began feeling better, but was ordered by the doctor to stay at home for a week with his parents and sister, who have not become sick.
The teen said the onset of severe symptoms - high temperature and intense fatigue - was surprisingly quick, but that he didn't feel too badly in the days leading up to his fever.
"I'm feeling pretty good now," he said, eager for the imposed quarantine to end. "I don't know what all the fuss is about."
(By Alison Auld, Halifax)
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Dan Demarais, a 41-year-old nurse, appears to have contracted a mild case of the illness two weeks ago from his 25-year-old roommate Theresa, who's also a nurse. She got a confirmed case while tending other H1N1 patients at Lions Gate Hospital in West Vancouver.
"She was home for seven days. I was just trying to take care of her and in the process just catching a lesser form of it - just chills and a cold that lasted about five days."
"First of all it comes on like a bad cold. You're going to have sniffles, headache and body aches, and then you start getting major temps and breaking fevers. For the first two or three days you're literally in bed just laid out; you're aching everywhere."
"I put myself on fluids and I started taking vitamin C and echinacea."
His roommate was hit harder.
"It went into her lungs, a lot of coughing and so forth. She was in bed for seven days. She's fine now. She was in more direct contact and I was secondary to her and I knew to stay away from her."
(By Steve Mertl, Vancouver)
*****
Marga Cugnet worked in an emergency room for 15 years and never caught many illnesses.
But Cugnet, who is the vice-president of primary and integrated health with the Sun Country Health Region in southeastern Saskatchewan, was knocked her off her feet by swine flu.
"I've never gotten sick this fast," said Cugnet, her voice hoarse from coughing.
"I usually have a pretty good immunity and had worked in emerg for years and didn't usually bring bugs home, so I was really quite surprised that I got it."
Cugnet said she was surprised at the severity of the symptoms.
"I just felt so rotten."
It started the morning of Oct. 23 when the Weyburn, Sask., woman said she had a slightly sore throat.
"By lunch I started coughing a little bit and by 1:30 that afternoon I could hardly walk. I felt so weak I just had to go home and started having severe chills, fever, coughing lots," she said.
The next day, Cugnet felt short of breath and had chest pain. Her doctor did an assessment over the phone and prescribed anti-virals.
With 30 years of nursing experience and a role in pandemic planning for the health region, Cugnet knows well the symptoms of H1N1, although her case is not lab confirmed. Health officials are no longer testing every case because the presence of H1N1 has been widely confirmed in the community.
It was six days before Cugnet was "up and around" for more than an hour at a time. She's still coughing.
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