I texted my youngest daughter to see how she was doing a few days after she had tested positive for COVID: “How’s my ‘COVID daughter’ doing?” I teased.
“Tired,” she responded, “I’m ready to get my energy back.”
A lack of vitality is relatively foreign to me. Dialing it down has been more of a problem. So, when my daughter spoke about longing to bounce back to her more normal energy level, it didn’t connect with me.
Then I tested positive for COVID.
Suddenly, sleeping a couple of hours past my regular wake-up time appears to be the new normal. Staring at the pages of my Bible during my morning devotions has replaced actively engaging with the Word. Taking a nap in the middle of the afternoon has become not a rare luxury but a consistent necessity. Climbing the stairs to my second-floor study sometimes feels like I’m walking the height of the Empire State Building.
I informed my daughter that I, too, was an official member of “Club Tired.”
Feeling wiped out is a common symptom of COVID-19, not only in the initial stages but for weeks and even months after testing positive. One study found that more than half of people who recover from COVID-19 still report fatigue 10 weeks later, regardless of the seriousness of the initial infection.
After I shared my fatigue issues with my son, he sent me a clip from one of our favorite movies: One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. One character, Pete Bancini (played by the late Josip Elic) is the tired, constantly confused inmate in the psych ward where most of the movie takes place. In response to the question, “How are you?” Bancini’s repeated answer is, “I’m tired.”
Bancini seems to be lurking around every corner of our house, whispering in my ear, “I’m tired.”
And I mutter back: “Me too, Bancini”.
But I can see good from my energy shortfall: it’s another reminder to me that it is most often as we experience the similar pain, hurt, loss, and fear of others that we are most able to commiserate with them.
When I was getting ready for rotator cuff surgery, I wanted to talk to someone who had been through that particular surgery, preferably someone whose surgery was a success.
When I’ve experienced a profound loss in my life, I prefer to listen to someone who has been through a similar kind of loss.
We tend to be attracted to people who are more likely to understand our plight.
In one episode, Bancini’s adds something to his simple response, “I’m tired.” He follows it with, “And it’s a lot of baloney.”
People like Bancini too often feel like no one understands the depth their emptiness. Does the attendant’s retort to Bancini typify the lack of compassion expressed to such people? “We know you’re tired; we’re all tired.”
That’s why it’s encouraging to find fellow strugglers who are still trudging along in the journey, with faces toward the sun, those courageous ones who haven’t stopped dead cold in their tracks, who, though tired and worn, won’t sit down and quit, and yet look back to us, waving for us to come along, spurring us on to keep walking, to stay in the game, to bide our time until another day dawns, a brighter morning, when renewed strength seeps into the depths of our being and we discover that it was all worth it.
Someone said, “It will get better before it’s over, and if it hasn’t gotten better, it’s not over.”
I’ll remind myself of that in the morning as I arise and plant my feet on the cold floor. And if Bancini peeks his head around the corner to remind me , “I’m tired,” I’ll nod sympathetically in his direction.
And keep moving.