Lieke is an active and sporty thirty-something with a busy job at the Safety Region. She was infected right away in the first wave of spring 2020. Doctors still don't know what to do with this new, unknown disease. When Lieke calls the GP post, scared and very short of breath, she has to pant through the phone. Pneumonia is the remote diagnosis. The beginning of a long and difficult road.
'In mid-March I became seriously ill. Severe headache, sore throat and fatigue. A few days later I was short of breath and also developed a fever. I was so short of breath that I hung out of the window at night to get air. I live alone and that was very frightening. I didn't dare to lock the door at night. The GP post also had no idea what to do. I had absolutely no energy, had to climb the stairs in five stages. Care providers kept saying that if there was a change, I had to call again. But then they still said that they couldn't do anything for me. They didn't know either.'
Everything changed
The intensity subsides after a few weeks, but Lieke does not fully recover. Fatigue, shortness of breath and dizziness remain. Due to the pressure at work and the absence of more sick colleagues, she still goes to work. After all, the Safety Region and the crisis team of the GHOR that Lieke works for are in the eye of the storm. She feels responsible for that. 'My motto was: if I can, I go, but that did me little good. By going to bed at seven o'clock and putting my social life on hold, I managed to keep going until December. Then I had no energy at all. On the way to my boyfriend in the south, things went so badly for me that I almost ended up in the crash barrier. From that moment on, everything changed.'
Burn out
The GP diagnoses a burnout and does not see any connection with the complaints that have persisted for almost a year since the corona infection. 'It was not until February that a lung specialist told me that I had long covid and he advised physiotherapy. But that did not work at all. My condition did improve somewhat, but I absolutely could not cope with all the noise there. I became completely overstimulated and exhausted. But I had to try this treatment before I was eligible for anything else.'
relapse
The vaccination brings a new low. 'I got seriously ill from it. With the same symptoms as after the infection. But I never want corona again, so I took the second shot. Fortunately, I had less trouble with that. In August, I started a rehabilitation program at Beatrixoord of the UMCG. Despite nightmares and insomnia, I had the idea that I was making progress. And then came the relapse. I haven't been there for three weeks now and I only have telephone contact. For some remote coaching. I need to regain my strength first. You can only recover when you can walk a bit, is the advice.'
Uncertainty gnaws at you
'I'm having a hard time with that relapse. I started looking into the scientific research that is currently taking place. Because I find it very difficult to just sit on the couch and do almost nothing. My employer gives me all the space I need, but of course something has to happen. Until I started the rehabilitation program, I still worked from home a bit. But I stopped doing that on the advice of my rehabilitation team. I couldn't combine the rehabilitation program and my low energy level with work. Now that my rehabilitation program has stopped, I'm slowly building it up again. It also makes me feel insecure. Are all those complaints related to long covid? No one can say anything about it with any certainty. Many healthcare providers are only moderately informed. That uncertainty gnaws at me.'
