Isolation as something familiar
| Title | Isolation as something familiar |
|---|---|
| Creator | Anonymous |
| Date | 2020-04-08 |
| Place | Toledo (Ohio) |
| Text | My wife grew up with a genetic disease called cystic fibrosis. Born in 1982, she was lucky that research and methods had developed enough to that point that, unlike many others, she managed to exceed the doctors' expectation that she would live past the age of twelve. It was around that time, however, that a different threat emerged. There's a bacterium called B. cepacia that exists all around us. For most people, it's nothing anyone would need to know anything about. But back in the early- to late-nineties, it wiped out about 70% of people in North America who had cystic fibrosis. As part of their treatment routines, most teenagers with cystic fibrosis had to spend a few weeks at a time in the hospital a few times each year, getting antibiotic treatments via I.V. Naturally, these patients were often kept on the some floor in the same wing and would interact freely with each other. Cystic patients would share meals in each others' rooms. Hospital cafeterias were their hangout spots. They would do treatments in groups. My wife tells stories of wheelchair races in the basements of hospitals and practical jokes that came about as the result of having bored teenagers in a place where a variety of lubricants and goo were plentiful. The onset of what's now called B. Cepacia Complex was not dissimilar to the outbreak of COVID-19. Doctors at first didn't know what was killing their patients. Once they learned the cause, they had to take radical action. In addition to new cautions and sanitation methods in hospitals, they developed a rule that will sound very familiar to the rest of us: Stay six feet apart. When the COVID lockdowns began, my wife was more than familiar with how things would go. One day when I came home she had put gloves and masks near the front door. This was a month before the CDC recommended that everyone wear masks, but I understood that she knew better than most people what was coming. In some ways, this has been harder on me than on her. The day-to-day tedium gets to me, but it is familiar to her - albeit with the difference that she gets to be at home this time. But, like most people, this is very unfamiliar ground for me. I have trouble sometimes with seeing the same things every day, having the same conversation with the same neighbor across the same backyard. Walking my dog on the same sidewalks down the same streets because the MetroParks will be more populous than I am comfortable with. It gets to me. And while my wife isn't always calm about the situation - unlike with cepacia, she has her family to worry about this time -, her hard-learned ability to deal with the monotony is helpful. In the broader world, some of what doctors and professionals know about dealing with COVID-19 comes from the experiences cystics had with cepacia. Turns out that here at home, I can learn from someone who experienced that same tragedy. And it makes things just a little easier to deal with. |
| Rights |
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| Language | eng |
| Identifier | https://lib.bgsu.edu/COVID19stories/items/show/43 |
| Type | Text |
