Moderna Second Shot. Woof.
I’ve been worried about writing this one. Really worried. I’ll be straight forward, authentic and genuine with you all; this shot was worse. I am worried about writing this blog because I do NOT want this blog to be reason for anyone to be scared of their Covid series. I hope that you all leave after reading this with some more reasons TO be vaccinated. Here goes!
I received my second Moderna vaccine on January 21st at around 4pm. I was PUMPED. Just like the time before I felt the weight of the fact that I GET to receive this vaccine. My mother is not yet vaccinated, neither of my sisters, and majority of my friends have yet to receive their vaccine. I appreciate that my job gives me great privilege in the priority status I was given in this vaccine line. I want that to be clear. I feel great responsibility to encourage and educate you all to get vaccinated when the opportunity arises.
The hospital did an amazing job of getting people in, vaccinated, had them wait their 15 minute reaction monitoring time and then out of there. It was smooth as can be! There was nervous chatter from a few of my friends; discussion about their reactions to the first shot. A few had fevers, mostly just sore arms. I left with my sweet tie dye band-aid and went home! It was overall, uneventful for one of the most eventful things in my life.
I remember sitting down on the couch with my husband that evening and getting a slight headache. I didn’t think much of it; increased my water intake and went to bed around 9pm.
I woke up the next morning feeling fine. I was at hour 15 and had no symptoms yet. I even hopped on my bike and did a 30 minute ride with 15 or so minutes of weights after. Easy-peasy. I ate lunch, worked and went about my day.
I started with a few aches around lunch time. Nothing unbearable but my immune system had definitely kicked in. (Yay!) My husband came home to check in on me. We had an event that afternoon and he wanted to see if I still wanted to go.
For my non-military readers, when a family or pilot is moving on to a new assignment they usually have a “fini flight”; their last flight on the plane at this assignment/location. It’s a loving celebration of what that person accomplished at this assignment and a goodbye party all in one. With COVID these events are usually immediate family and maybe a few pilots/friends. Small. Safe. Masks. Outdoor. You get the gist.
This particular pilot and his wife are two of our closest friends. They do not yet have kids but love our children like they are theirs and show up for us so often and without any expectation of fancy food or entertainment. Christmas gifts, kids birthday parties, you name it; these two are the best of the best when it comes to military friends. I’m not sure I can adequately say what their friendship means to us and our kids. Riley and Will are just the best and will be SO missed in our day to day lives.
I really wanted to attend this fini flight. I knew I wasn’t feeling fabulous, but tried to buck up and decided to attend for a short while. I made it about an hour and looked at my husband and we knew it was time to go.
I snuggled into my husband’s truck and wrapped my cardigan around myself and we picked up both kids. By the time we got home I had the heater on myself at 80 degrees on full blast and the seat heater on. Whoops. I figured I was beginning to get feverish and told my husband he was “single dad-ing” it tonight. He could see it written all over my face and told me to go to bed.
At this point I changed into my pajamas, and got under the covers and was chilled to the bone. I took my temperature, I was at 102. I took a dose of ibuprofen and crawled, shivering, back to bed. The next few hours were pretty miserable. I wont lie. I had terrible body aches, and the fever made me feel like I was freezing. I was wearing sweatpants and wore my daughter’s winter hat. I rechecked my temperature an hour after the ibuprofen and was still 101.5. I caved and took some acetaminophen, too. I get a weird aftertaste with acetaminophen so I rarely take it. But desperate times call for desperate measures. (Poor pitiful, Carrie and her two hour fever). I did start to feel the chills dissipate with the acetaminophen. I then took half of a Unisom and promptly put myself to bed at 6:30pm. I didn’t wake up over night, so apparently at some point things faded.
I woke up the next morning a complete change from the night before. No fever, no aches, no chills, no headache. It was fast, and furious but again, fast. I’d do it again in a minute to keep my community and loved ones safe.
I encourage you all to get the vaccine unless you have a contraindication or your personal provider encourages you otherwise. Covid has killed over 2 MILLION people. MILLION. Heart disease will likely barely hold the lead in causes of death with COVID just trailing. We have to do our part to stop this, to slow down these numbers.
Mutations. This probably scares me the most. When we give the virus a host (i.e. a human) the virus takes over our cells and makes copies upon copies upon copies of itself. Well, some of these copies have mistakes. Little tiny changes that can change everything for us. They can make the virus more deadly, more infectious. Anything. When we give the virus opportunity to replicate (spread from person to person and make copies of itself) we continue its ability to mutate. Across the world there already are several mutations of Covid-19. These mutations (UK, South Africa, Brazil) seem to be more easily spread but we aren’t sure if they’re more deadly. There have been rumors about whether they will render our brand spanking new vaccines ineffective. The jury is still out. We must stop transmission, we must decrease cases. Our viable option to help with that NOW is vaccination.
It is our responsibility to stop this pandemic. The virus’ one goal is to live. To continue to copy itself. I guess that’s ours too but I think we may have to fight harder, fight better.
Tomorrow myself and my RN students are going to be giving vaccinations in a city wide vaccine event. I encourage you to reach out in your community and see if there are opportunities to volunteer. Counties may need intake personnel, nurses, EMT’s or pharmacists to give vaccines. I encourage you to donate some of your time.
I’ll attach some resources for Covid Vaccination, information on the variants below and my favorite dedicated COVID page.
I am sending you all love and hope for vaccination in 2021.
Covid Vaccine Info- Mayo Clinic
Your local epidemiologst – A fantastic Texas epidemiologist taking data and making it understandable and attainable to the public. LOVE this blog/facebook/instagram.