The Queen's cold

Gotta love iPhone suggested location

Obviously there is no way to know if it is the same virus from which the Queen has been suffering, but I, like so many people I know, have suffered from a particularly bad cold over the last few months. It is telling that she was publicly so ill as to not attend Christmas events.

I really am sick of it, and it has now been a month.

More than once (like today) I started to think it may be over now. It is mostly a cough, sometimes dry, sometimes coughing something up, but seems to have lots more in store than just a cough. I was tired, feverish, aching all over, to various degrees for the whole month.

I am not one to stop working for something like a cold, though I was trying to work from home even more than usual as no need to infect the office. Most of the time I was able to do some work, but quite a few days I could not even do that. I know some will cry "man flu", and I understand that, but this has been a real bugger.

A few times I have had to go to the office - two TV interviews in the last week. Thankfully recorded so they can edit out the coughing. As often is the case with a cough, if I stay still, don't talk to anyone, and work at home, I feel like things are going well. Go outside and change temperature, or start talking, and shit hits the fan.

I'd love to know how/why a virus can be so much more resilient than others. Clearly we win the battle - everyone I know who has had this, whether 3 weeks or 6 weeks or whatever, has "survived" it. So what makes one virus take so long to be defeated I wonder?

Even so, this really long bout of being ill is depressing. I have been taking paracetamol and sudafed regularly (at a bit below max dosage, as I do worry) for weeks now.

This week was extra special, on Tuesday I went to the office to meet a TV crew for Euronews. I had a coughing fit, and coughed so hard I pulled a muscle. I do not recall agony like this ever before, I was thinking I must have cracked a rib or something, I could not move, I could hardly breath, let alone talk. My staff were great, especially Andrew and Jimi, an ambulance was called. They got me on gas and air which helped. They concluded I had pulled something! After a couple of hours I was able to struggle though a TV interview thanks to a very patient TV crew before getting codeine and valium, which I then spent two days solid on. I could not lay down properly, ended up sort of propped up on my sofa to sort of sleep. To be honest, neither codeine nor valium seem to do much for me. Thankfully over the two days the pain has gradually reduced.

So, once again, I find myself hoping that this is close to the end. The muscle pain is mostly gone, or at least manageable. I have to be "careful" coughing, which is, in itself, strange.

Good luck to anyone else that has this - I know some that have had it as "an annoying cough" for many weeks and little more - well done for fighting it so well. Personally, I have been suffering. I suspect there are those way worse off than I, and you have my sympathies. Get well soon.

P.S. I discovered the ambulance crew were self employed working for a company that subcontracts the work from NHS, and so we like Uber drivers, even fined if they have too long a break. That is going to be the next uproar, I am sure. They were very good though.