In a new op-ed for the Washington Post, author Madeline Miller writes about her experiences battling long Covid.
Miller, known for her novels The Song of Achilles and Circe, writes that she contracted Covid-19 in February of 2020, the month before the disease shut down the U.S. for several months.
“In the weeks after infection, my body went haywire,” she writes. “My ears rang. My heart would start galloping at random times. I developed violent new food allergies overnight. When I walked upstairs, I gasped alarmingly … Looking at old photos, I was overwhelmed with grief and bitterness. I didn’t recognize myself. On my best days, I was 30 percent of that person.”
Miller writes that she soon learned she had long Covid, the name given to a syndrome that affects some of those who have been infected with Covid-19. Long Covid is poorly understood, but it tends to cause symptoms of fatigue, memory loss, and muscle weakness.
“There is no cure for long covid,” she writes. “Two of my friends went on to have strokes. A third developed diabetes, a fourth dementia. One died.”
Miller writes that she still suffers from fatigue but is writing again, and she still wears masks.
“So how long am I going to do this? Until indoor air is safe for all, until vaccines prevent transmission, until there’s a cure for long covid,” she writes. “Until I’m not risking my family’s future on a grocery run. Because the truth is that however immortal we feel, we are all just one infection away from a new life.”
Michael Schaub, a journalist and regular contributor to NPR, lives near Austin, Texas.
