After a fitful night of coughing, I somehow managed to drag myself out of bed, shower, dress, and begin the process of taking one more online Covid-19 test, which requires contacting a live person through the Navica app and eMed, monitoring the test with me.
I knew it would be positive the second time we did the self-test in the past 24 hours. I still have many Covid-19 symptoms, whether Omicron or another variant. My throat is red and raw, my voice gravely and unrecognizable, and the cough…Well, the cough…It’s brutal.
It’s only been four days since I first tested positive on the ship. The tiredness is still prevalent, but the achy painfulness has waned, the headache and the feverish sensation that lasted for days. What did we expect?
Even if I tested negative today, I wondered how I could possibly get on the Queen Mary 2, manage to walk the long corridors, dress for dinner, and participate in events and fancy dinners. I could barely keep my head up to eat a few bites for breakfast this morning. It has hit me hard.
No, I don’t need to go to a doctor or hospital. I had a worse virus in South Africa in 2021 when I had trouble breathing and yet had a negative Covid test. The electric nebulizer and medication are helping tremendously, and today, for the first time since this began almost a week ago, I feel like the dry cough is loosening up a bit.
When I can get a negative test, we can fly to the US, which is up for grabs. Since we had to cancel today’s cruise on the Queen Mary 2, we’ll now have to fly to Minnesota from Southampton once I can manage a negative test. Tom is well on the mend. We didn’t use another test on him since his symptoms were almost gone. If one of us tested positive we couldn’t go on the cruise anyway. Why use up another test kit?
We will not wait for the next sailing on May 8th. If I test negative within a week, we’ll arrive in Minneapolis by May 1 as planned, head to Nevada on May 15, and then fly from Nevada to South Africa on May 22. We’d lose all the bookings we made in the US during May since we’d have to move fights, hotels, etc. Most likely, we’ll lose the airfare from New York to Minneapolis anyway. We didn’t want to compound the situation.
At this point, until I test negative, we can’t plan anything. We extended this hotel room for four more nights when I will test again. If it’s still positive at that point, we’ll extend it again. There’s nothing else we can do. It’s out of our control. In the interim, I’m resting, eating healthy foods, and treating the symptoms to the best of my ability.
They say Omicron is like a bad cold, at worst. It is not like any cold I’ve ever had. It’s sneaky. It’s insidious. And for some, it’s relentless. I only hope it is over soon.
This morning, when we couldn’t reach a live person at Cunard Cruise Line to report we won’t be going on the cruise, Tom decided to walk to the port to report it to a representative. We were concerned about them not perceiving us as a “no show,” negating our opportunity for a future cruise credit which they promise for positive Covid results.
Tom just now returned after a frustrating time at the port but managed to show my test results and our cruise documents to a representative who hopefully will document our reasons for not boarding.
We will keep you updated as we work our way through yet another challenging time in our world travels. Nope, we’re not considering giving up! (In case you were wondering).
Be well.
Photo from one year ago today, April 24, 2021:
