I’m always writing from the first-person perspective of a “sheep” — a little joke on the word “positive” in Chinese sounding like “sheep.” I really didn’t expect that today I would become one too.
When the pandemic was at its worst last year, our area went through traffic controls, a citywide lockdown, and mass PCR testing. Back then, I volunteered to help with the community-wide testing in my residential compound, and I didn’t get infected. There was a time when I took four PCR tests within 24 hours, and I still didn’t test positive. Most of my colleagues at work caught it, but I didn’t. Even on the day Ms. Wu tested positive, I went over to her place to hang out, and somehow I was fine.
So for a long time I honestly believed I was one of those chosen workers blessed by fate — or at least someone with unusually good immunity. When the trending joke appeared online that “the first symptom of testing positive is insisting you won’t,” I still felt completely fearless.
That is why this time caught me so off guard. For one thing, I was on weekly duty at school and had basically stayed on campus without going anywhere else. For another, I hadn’t noticed any obvious drop in immunity or anything like that. Yesterday, after finishing my third class, I started feeling dizzy during the fourth period. At first I simply assumed I hadn’t rested enough. Since starting duty week, I had been sleeping late every night and getting up at six in the morning.
By lunchtime, though, I began to feel that something was wrong. Besides the dizziness, my limbs were sore and weak, and I had no appetite. Then I remembered that in the middle of the previous night, half-asleep, I had felt my throat hurting badly and had been extremely thirsty. At that point, I figured I was probably sick.
My original plan was to go home after the students got up from their midday nap, take a shower, change clothes, and also submit some supplementary materials for the interactive filing process. I put my head down on the office desk and slept for a while. When I woke up, my head felt as if it had been filled with lead. I wiped my forehead with cold water, felt just a tiny bit better, then drove off to hand in the materials before going home.
Once I got home, I took my temperature with a mercury thermometer. Well then: 38.9°C. Luckily, there was still some ibuprofen at home that Ms. Wu had left behind, so I took one and planned to sleep for a bit. After lying down, waves of cold ran through my body, so I wrapped myself tightly in the quilt. About forty minutes later I woke up feeling burning hot. I checked my temperature again, and it hadn’t gone down at all.
So I called my leader to ask for leave, and the request was approved. But then I thought about the three evening self-study periods I still had that night — starting this week, one more had been added — plus the morning self-study and four classes the next day. With that many classes, I really felt bad asking others to cover for me. So I took a hot shower. Afterward, I was sweating all over, but the fever clearly felt less severe, so I went back to school.
The cafeteria food last night happened to be especially good. I seemed to have regained my appetite and ate a large bowl. I kept sweating the whole time. During the three evening periods, I only actually taught one; for the other two, I had the students read and write reading notes. After taking ibuprofen, I went to sleep at around eleven.
This morning I woke up feeling all right, apart from a runny nose. During breakfast, Mr. Chen asked whether I wanted to test with an antigen kit again, saying that maybe yesterday it had failed to show because I was feverish. So I tested again. The T line was very faint, but it was there. I had definitely tested positive.
Mr. Tan came to find me and said he could help watch two of my classes. He also went to get me some masks. Mr. Chen called and took one class for me as well. In the group chat, Mr. Feng asked whether my classes had been arranged; when he learned that the second period, which was about to start, still had no one assigned, he immediately drove to school. In the afternoon, Ms. Liu also messaged me and took over my two classes for tomorrow. I’m truly grateful to them for stepping in so generously.
Once it was confirmed that I was positive, it really wasn’t appropriate for me to keep teaching. So I went home in the morning. After getting back, I didn’t feel especially miserable at first. I even browsed around online for a while, only going to sleep after the dizziness became too strong. Just like the day before, I felt cold while sleeping and wrapped myself tightly in the quilt. When I woke up, I felt very hot again, though this time I hadn’t sweated. I took my temperature: 39.1°C.
I took another ibuprofen and slept again, this time without covering myself with the quilt. When I woke up, the fever had dropped to 38.5°C. Apart from waves of heat coming and going, there wasn’t much other discomfort.
Friends have told me that the symptoms may last several days, and that the “swallowing knives” sore throat usually arrives on the third day. Fortunately, the day after tomorrow is the weekend. Counting today, I have four days to rest properly. I should be able to get through it.
This is my first time testing positive. I’ve realized that I may not be any different from everyone else after all, and I don’t have some special constitution. From now on, I won’t dare call myself a chosen worker again.