Category: Mindful Living

Before I tell you about my experience being sick, my heart aches for every person affected by this pandemic. For every life lost, I feel profound sorrow. For every person who is sick or recovering or long-hauling this thing… well… I hope you get better. I hope you come out the other side of this thing without lingering issues. I hope you are well now, as you read this. Most importantly, to all who have lost a loved one or a business or an income or anything I miss addressing… I’m deeply sorry.

I wish you love and healing.

Despite eighteen days of physical distancing, with my husband being the sole shopper and going to no more than one grocery store per trip (two trips per week if prescriptions were needed), I developed symptoms of some kind of virus.

It could have been a regular cold, but it felt different.

Although we had cleaned our reusable bags, had been persistent and hyper-vigilant about wearing masks, washing our hands frequently… sanitizing surfaces, cleaning taps, handles, door knobs, tv controllers, smart phones, keypads, dials, mouse(s), flash drives and so forth… we did not start cleaning our grocery purchases until about ten days into lockdown.

So, it’s possible that I picked up something from the grocery purchases, or from the mail, or from a trip to the local hospital for a pre-scheduled medical test. I’ll never know. My husband had been home from his place of work since March 20… and gratefully, was showing no symptoms at all.

My first day of isolation was April 7.

For me, the virus showed itself in the form of a sore throat, then body aches, then lots of nasal mucus. I soon also experienced heavy sweating and headache. But no cough. No trouble breathing, and no headache. One day later, and on came chills and a low-grade fever of 99.48 F (my normal temperature is 97.7 F to 98.42 F). My sore throat worsened and I developed a hoarse voice.

By evening of the second day of illness, I was noticing shortness of breath upon mild exertion. All of these symptoms, plus a stiff neck and swollen glands in my throat… lasted for many days.

I had a fever for thirty-four of the forty-two days I spent in isolation… reaching no higher than 99.86 F. I started to feel better by day thirty-seven.

I left isolation (my bedroom) on day forty-three, after virus symptoms had subsided, and seventy-two hours had passed without a temperature.

My husband remained healthy. He was my biggest worry. We were very careful. I missed hugging him. I love him so very much. We make a great team. We developed at routine pretty quickly. Some things were awkward at first: making meals, cleaning dishes, single bathroom use and such. But, by the time two days had passed, we had a solid routine in place.

My bedroom became my sanctuary. I was content, mostly because my isolation kept my husband safe.

On day eighteen of my isolation, I was tested for COVID-19. About seventy-two hours later, my results came back negative. A representative from our local hospital had called to confirm the negative result. I told her that my symptoms were still persistent and unlike anything I’ve had before… seventeen days of throat irritation, swollen glands, chest heaviness, fever and so forth. I was concerned about a false negative test—because I was very worried about infecting my husband.

The nurse told me that she’s heard of many other people saying the same thing. She advised me that the test itself is not faulty, but if it is not performed well enough to get enough mucus on the swab (from the back of the throat), then the test can miss the virus. So… well, what do you do with that information? Very little. Just one day at a time.

So, yes, I was nasty sick for many days, and I’m not certain that I did not have COVID-19.

Today, I could buy an antibody test, but apparently COVID-19 antibodies are hard to detect after four months have passed since infection. I left my isolation on May 19 (almost eight months ago).

I’ll never know for sure whether or not I actually contracted COVID-19. Nevertheless, I don’t regret choosing to isolate. And as the title of this post suggests… during those dreadful sick days, I also experienced the wonderful benefits of 42 days in isolation.

If you’ve made it this far, thanks for your patience. I want to tell you about the extraordinarily peaceful moments I experienced during my days in isolation.

I want to tell you about the people I met, and the lessons I learned.

Part two of two:

It’s time to pay attention.

When I learned about living mindfully, my life changed profoundly. After my first time sitting formally in meditation, almost immediately I noticed a sense of calm ‘rightness’ within me… a soundness deep inside that I’d not felt for a very long time.

This sense of stability and wholeness, a quality that seemed both familiar and revolutionary, may have been a wee spark at the time, but it was there, and I had definitely embodied it. 

Now, having said that, sitting formally for the first time, and for the first few attempts that follow… many of us can feel as if we are somehow “doing it wrong”. This initial reaction is common.

We think we’re failing because we can’t stop thinking, our nose itches, our back hurts, and every second seems a struggle.

If this sounds familiar to you… give yourself a break… and some loving kindness and compassion. Keep at it. Be patient. Keep practicing. There’s no right or wrong way to meditate. There’s nothing to fail.

Just sit quietly, breathe with awareness, leave judgement aside, and as your practice grows, so will you.

Now, here’s something else I learned early on. Let’s say after cultivating your mindfulness skills you realize just how much you love meditating and you want to tell everyone about the benefits of mindful living. Not everyone wants to hear about your mindfulness experience. Matter of fact, in my case, no one did. And that’s okay. Well into my practice, I discovered that most of the top mindfulness experts advise newcomers to keep their mindfulness journey to themselves. They don’t suggest this as if you are to keep some kind of deep, dark secret. They give this advice because taking it helps you to stay focused on your well-being.

The people who are close to you will see the benefits of your living mindfully just by experiencing how you conduct yourself. And that’s how you spread the positive news.

And that brings me back to how living mindfully has profoundly changed my life. Although I very quickly realized the benefits of meditation from the first time I sat, a lot of time would go by before I recognized just how much the practice had genuinely changed me. So, what is mindfulness anyway? And what is it not? Let’s start with the latter question first. And just so I’m clear, although I’ve read a lot about mindfulness, and listened to many experts, I am not an expert. I’m only sharing what my experience has been.

Mindfulness is not meditation, but meditation is a wonderful way to cultivate awareness.

Additionally, meditation doesn’t always mean sitting still on a cushion or chair. It can be done while walking or eating or washing the dishes or gardening or, well, you get it. And even though mindfulness was taught by the Buddha, it isn’t a religious belief or system. Mindfulness is not about sitting back and relaxing and it isn’t always easy. It takes commitment and perseverance, and constant gentle reminders. And finally, mindfulness is not about shutting down or stopping thoughts. It’s quite the opposite of that impossibility…

Mindfulness really gives you some remarkable insight into how your mind works. Oh boy, the things you can learn about yourself!

Mindfulness doesn’t mean you won’t feel sad. In the same way mindfulness brings awareness to your thoughts, it brings awareness to your emotions… all of them, the good, the bad, and the neutral. And it brings awareness to your bodily sensations too.

Here’s what mindfulness is to me. It’s bringing caring attention to the present moment without judgement, just observation of what is. This doesn’t mean that I don’t ever have an opinion. I do. I just try to state my opinion mindfully… aware of my thoughts in the moment, aware of my bodily sensations in the moment… noticing them… letting them go… over and over and over again… while being present for whoever I’m talking to, listening mindfully, trying not to interrupt (which is quite the learning curve for some of us).

Mindfulness is being present even if the moment isn’t pleasant.

Practicing mindfulness has helped me to find acceptance in things as they are. Again, this doesn’t mean that I don’t make changes in my life if I feel that I need to improve upon something, especially when it affects my well-being. Practicing mindfulness just means that I do so from a more peaceful place of compassion and insight… and if I’m lucky, maybe even a little wisdom.

Living mindfully has helped me to make decisions with true awareness… without being mindlessly led by the ongoing chatter inside my head.

And mindfulness helps me to pay attention to the sensations in my body, the telltale signs that show me how I’m managing health-wise. For most people, the relationship between thoughts and decision making is fairly clear, but bodily sensations… not so much. And yet, when we’re nervous we get ‘butterflies’ in our stomachs. When we are stressed, we experience headaches or belly aches. When we are in pain, our muscles tighten and our bodies hurt.

So, it’s time to pay attention, don’t you think?

Well, there you have it. That’s enough, I think. Go find out for yourself. See what you can learn when you bring living mindfully into your way of being.

Part one of two:

My life changed in a profound way.

Before I practised mindfulness-based living, I moved through each day with little to no sense of what was truly happening inside my head, or what was unfolding within my heart, or what was occurring inside my body. I lived unaware of the constant chatter dictating my thoughts, and the emotions influencing my sense of well-being, and the bodily sensations clamoring for my attention. In time, I grew tired.

And as we are learning, or at least some of us are, the cost of mindlessness is health and contentment. And yet so many of us don’t bother to stop and evaluate why we are struggling. We don’t take the time to find out why we feel overwhelmed and exhausted. Don’t we care to know how to feel better? Instead, many of us just carry on tearing through the day, collapsing at the end of it, and wondering why we feel so unsatisfied.

I get it. I did the same thing… for a long time.

But when my health began to pay more than it could afford, I finally took notice. I stopped in my tracks and took a good look around. And in that moment of observation, I began to see and hear and feel things I hadn’t been aware of for a really, really long time. I heard the obsessive chatter in my head. I noticed the longing in my heart. And I felt the butterflies in my belly and the tension in my muscles.

Ah… here I am, I thought.

Here I Am.

And soon thereafter, I began to research a mysterious practice I’d heard about… a practice called mindfulness. I read books and magazine articles. I investigated the various forms of practise, even making time for bringing it into my life. But, it wasn’t until I finally transitioned from an intellectual discernment of what I thought mindfulness was, to an embodied experience of what mindfulness is, that… my life changed in a profound way.

There’s a story in every Thing.