WELLNESS WEDNESDAY

Hey folks, Sally Riggs here, psychologist, fellow long hauler, and your Long COVID coach, and welcome to another Wellness Wednesday. So here we are three and a half years into the pandemic. And unfortunately, people are still getting long COVID. And also, unfortunately, things are really not that different than they were when I got Long COVID in March 2020. And so today, I wanted to talk about something that I see coming up a lot.

Do I have Long COVID? And it's a question I've seen recently posted in Facebook groups, people listing out all their symptoms and saying, is this Long COVID? My doctor doesn't know. And so I wanted to talk about that today. There may be new people tuning in here who have that same question. And in all honesty, it seems as if we don't have a way of telling. But actually, we do. And so that's what I wanted to talk more about today. If you are wondering whether you have Long COVID Keep watching because I probably have an answer for you. So it's true, we don't have a diagnostic test for Long COVID. And it's also true that a lot of physicians don't really understand Long COVID.

They don't understand the likelihood of it happening still. And when we show up in our primary care physician or GP's office with weird and wonderful symptoms, they're not thinking, Oh! this could be Long COVID. They're used to doing other differential diagnoses, and there are other things that are coming to their mind. And so I have seen people say, you know, we don't have a definitive test for Long COVID. So it's hard for me to say, but I want to say a little bit more about that.

First of all, the CDC's definition of Long COVID seems to refer to any lingering symptoms for more than three months. And I just want to clarify because many, many, many of us do not have lingering symptoms, we had an Acute COVID infection, and we recovered from that. And then months later, we got different symptoms. So if you have different symptoms, if they are not lingering symptoms, do not be confused. Also, the three-month thing is confusing. It's very normal, for COVID, Acute COVID infection to go on for a while, it is not just a cold that resolves after 10 days. And many people have a lingering Cough or lingering Shortness of Breath for up to three months. And that is very normal. And that doesn't mean that you have Long COVID. I have many friends who got a COVID infection in 2020 and still had some residual Shortness of Breath, Exercise Intolerance, up to a year later. That is also not Long COVID. Just to clarify here, because I think lots of people are Miss lumping in all very mild things that are not what we're talking about, and what those of us with Long COVID have experienced.

But if you are past that three-month window, and if you have new symptoms, or lingering symptoms, and I'm going to talk specifically about what those are in a moment, then you may well have Long COVID. And at last count, I think there were 210 different symptoms that had been logged for a Long COVID. So it really is a very broad range. And you may have some symptoms that are unusual and that people are not typically classified as Long COVID. The key three ones that people talk about a lot are Chronic Fatigue, Brain Fog, and Post-Exertional Malaise which doesn't mean that you went for a 20-mile run and you're a little bit tired. It means that you walk to the kitchen and back, and then two days later, you can't do anything. But it's a little bit more than that. So if you don't have those classic symptoms, and excuse me, if you don't have those classic symptoms, and you're worrying is this Long COVID, nobody seems to know, there is actually a working definition.

So there's something called a Delphi Study. And this is where a group of researchers and or clinicians come together and establish a consensus on something. And this was actually done in the UK in 2020. And it was published in 2021. And they listed out a whole bunch of symptoms that I'm going to show you now that if you have any one of these, the consensus is that you more than likely have Long COVID. So actually, it is easier to diagnose than we thought. And, for me, something that I come back to again and again, is the Duck Test. If it walks like a duck, and it quacks like a duck, it's probably a duck. And so let's take a look at the symptoms and see if you are walking and quacking like a duck. So this is the Delphi Study I was talking about. And it was published by Nurik and his colleagues in 2021. And what they said was, if you have one or more of any of these symptoms, you more than likely have Long COVID. And this is new onset Breathlessness, Chest Pain, Heart Racing, or Pounding in your Chest, Higher Heart Rate than normal even when sitting or lying down, A whistling or squeaking sound when breathing, weird rash on your skin, Hives, Abdominal Pain, Diarrhea, Stiff Joints, Nerve Pain, Spasmodic Sounding Voice, Fatigue, now this one I mentioned, but again, not just from physical activity, but also from emotional or mental exertion. And that's really the important thing here. Prolonged High Body Temperature, Tingling, Numbness or Burning Feeling in your Hands or Feet, Brain Fog, Memory Loss.

Now, that's quite a lot to remember. But you can always rewind here and go back and look at that list. And I will be telling you at the end, another place where you can access this. If you have one of those that started in the last three months, you more than likely have Long COVID. Especially, if you know that you have had an Acute COVID Infection. And these days, it is harder to know because we're not testing as much again and some of the symptoms do look like other infections. But even if you don't know, if one of these things has started for you and you haven't had it before, the chances are you have long COVID If you have more than one on this list and these Facebook posts that I've seen people are writing out 20,30 Different things that they're experiencing you more than likely have Long COVID The other thing I want to talk a little bit about is high-risk factors because again, if you are on this high-risk list and you have one or more of these things, you even more likely have Long COVID. And this isn't really being talked about enough. But there are some things that we know that make more people more likely to experience Long COVID And they're not what you might think in terms of high risk factors. So let's take a look.

If you are female, and I think this is talked about men do get Long COVID. So if you identify as male do not think that it's not you but if you identify as female, you are more likely, especially if you are between the ages of 30 and 50. Again, we do see people outside those parameters, but these are the most at risk. If you are athletic or sporty or had a high level of fitness before you got COVID. Also if you are a very driven type A achievement-oriented, go go go type person. If you do know that you had COVID, and your infection was mild, or if you don't know that you had COVID, I was asymptomatic. And then some of these are also pre-existing conditions that can make it more likely that we might get Long COVID. So something called Atopy, which is a medical word that refers to Eczema, Asthma, and Allergies. If you were a very allergic kid, or who had an inhaler, or was reacting on your skin to things like laundry detergent, that comes under a category, medically that is referred to as Atopy. And that makes it more likely that you would get Long COVID. Also, if you had a previous Post Viral Fatigue, for example, I had one when I was in college, as did many, many, many people who now have Long COVID Or similarly pre-existing Fibromyalgia, something called Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome, which again, if you have it, you will know or IBS, which again, many of us had pre COVID and predisposes us to Long COVID. Now, I'm not going to get too much into the details of why because this video would be two hours long rather than 10 minutes. But if you again, have any of those high-risk factors, and you have one or more of the previous list, I think at this point, we're almost saying you definitely have Long COVID. And if you're still not sure, go to my website, sallyriggs.com. On the homepage, there's a little pop-up that comes up on the screen that says is it Long COVID quiz. And there's a quiz that covers exactly those symptoms that we listed out, that will pop up on the screen for you to take and give you more information on this. So if you have come across this video and wondering if you have Long COVID or if you're watching this video and you have other friends who are not sure, feel free to forward it to them, because my hunch is you probably do. But I know that the medical community right now is still not rallying around enough to get this information out there. And if you're watching this video, and you're saying, oh my goodness, this totally resonates with me. I totally do. Please go and watch the How I Recovered from the Long COVID video. And there are tons of other videos that you can dip into to help you with the beginning of your recovery because you can recover. And we have so much information about that out there now too.

I hope you have a tolerable week and I look forward to seeing you again on another Wellness Wednesday.

Take care!