Thread by @TheRealDoctorT

#Storytime At the beginning of COVID.
There was so much we didn’t know. 💡
Some people didn’t even believe in the virus, but there was that moment.
Where you and I could no longer ignore it was real
But, When did Coronavirus Become Real?
#ShareTheMicNowMed @typicallysilent
/1

When I think about where we are now, I almost forget what life was like before...
Before masked faces became commonplace, and social distancing pulled us 6 ft away from each other. Before we became well adjusted to awkward elbow taps and daily zoom chats.
/2

But when did coronavirus actually, become a real thing?
When did it go from being some external far off threat to right outside my front door?
To inside the hospital.
To on the other side of the anteroom?
When did it go from being one of the many distant threats,
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to be the only meaningful threat I encounter on a daily basis.
I can still remember hearing about the Wuhan virus in January.
It was foreign then.
Affecting foreign people, in a foreign country.
/4

Even when one of my team members' parents was barred entry into the U.S. simply for being from Wuhan.
It wasn't real for me.
Because those were "her" parents, not mine. And it was in "her" hometown.
Not mine.
/5

In the following weeks, new words entered my daily vernacular.
Words like Don and Doff, social distancing, COVID-19 and P.U.I.
Sessions on P.P.E. replaced once educational conferences. Long talks about the threat of coronavirus would commonly interrupt rounds.
/6

Then the first cases affecting Americans hit both at sea by the Princess Cruise line and on land in Seattle.
Soon a nursing home was overrun by its own outbreak.
But this was in Seattle.
I was still safe, right?
We were still safe...right?!?!
/7

I mean what state in the U.S. could be further from Georgia than Washington?
But then a case was reported in New York.
And the cases started piling up even in patients who had never traveled.
/8

The Dow Jones plummeted, bottled water evaporated and toilet paper and hand sanitizer turned to gold and saffron.
That was the fear setting in.
But fear is complicated.
Our greatest fears don't always lie in the "known" but the "unknown."
/9

What is this virus?
Who gets it?
How is it spreading?
Who should be worried? Is there a cure? How long do I have to live?
Maybe that last question was a bit dramatic, or was it???
/10

Ms. T was ~50y/o F with a history of HIV, HTN, and a kidney transplant in 2016.
I saw her in clinic and at the behest of her primary care doctor, she was admitted to rule out COVID-19.
She had a bad weekend, but she wasn't dying, right?
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She developed diarrhea on Friday, vomiting on Saturday and spiked a temp on Sunday?
But still, her primary doc says, "We should just rule her out."
She was examined, transported, admitted, swabbed, and monitored. And all the while I donned and doffed and doffed and donned.
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I was careful.
But in the back of my head, I kept my own little secret.
I just knew she was negative.
The lady barely had a cough and hadn’t even spiked a temperature since she was admitted.
/13

But one night around 7:30 I get from a call from my attending while at home.
He’s never called me after 5.
“Hey Chuma, I just thought you should know. Our lady in room 51, she's positive. She's positive for COVID-19."
/14

When did Coronavirus become real???
From then on entering my apartment became a process.

Whitecoat stays in the hospital, pager in the car, shoes at the door, alcohol swabs to the phone, scrubs in the washer.

But what about this badge? Were going to need more wipes.
/15

And then there was Ms. T. whose room I had donned and doffed before entering numerous times, but today I might as well have donned my black robe and scythe because she read my face.
Her: I have it, don't I? I have it Right!
Me: Yes, yes you do.
/16

Then the questions erupted out of her and kept coming and coming...
How did I get it? How did this happen?
What about my mother?
I’ve only been to the grocery store and my house for the last week? How does it spread? What about my daughter? Is there a cure?!?!
/17

How long do I have to live??!?!
Looking into her face and realizing that I had been running the very same questions in my own head for the last 12 hours.
I remember EXACTLY when Coronavirus became real...
for the both of us.
/18

That's my story! Aight, first one down!

If you are like me and think reading📚 is dope, but listening🎧 is even better.

Check out the story read here!

@TypicallySilent

podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/whe…

/fin