Waiting game

A family member thought they had a cold for several days starting last week. They came to visit today, since their symptoms were mostly gone. Just to be sure, we asked them to use the at-home COVID-19 test kit we’d ordered a week ago, and the test came up positive. They didn’t believe it (“those lines were already there!”), so we had them test with the other kit to verify, and that one also came up positive. They headed home some of us went for a walk, but now we’re wondering if we’ll be coming down with it soon, and if so, how bad it will be. They always wear their mask when they visit, including this time, so it seems like there’s a good chance we were protected. Of course, they ran us out of both at-home tests, and the stores have been all out of them for weeks, so we ordered another 2-pack of tests, which should arrive in early February. And now we wait, hoping none of us come down with any symptoms. 

 

Update 1/25/2022: I realize a lot of people advocate for thinking positively, but today it was a relief to get a negative test result, after a close brush with COVID-19 last Monday. We used our only at-home test kit a week ago, to verify that we were exposed (they just had waning cold symptoms). Today we conveniently received some free test kits from USG and the State of Colorado, one of which we just used to see if we’d caught it, and it appears we may have dodged that bullet. I’ve read that these negative tests aren’t conclusive, but it’s an encouraging data point. Hooray for masks, distancing, hand washing, sanitizing, and all that jazz. The test was straightforward to use, as it was supplemented by an app that gave explicit instructions for each step, and registered the results. It even gave me the option to email the results to my physician, which was not helpful, as his office doesn’t do email.