[aeim]

I'm sorry to hear that.

This is an open question which I've pondered for a while (so atemerev, your circumstances may not align, but I hope you don't mind me asking it here):

> I wonder how often/ to what degree, circumstances of long covid might be attributed to individuals whom pre-covid were on the cusp of developing more severe symptoms of burnout or depression (for the first time), being abruptly nudged over that threshold?

It strikes me, this likely happened in some cases, such that some individuals simultaneously faced both kinds of cognitive phenomena for the first time

So implicit – I wonder how often the two are conflated? Or how one ought to reconcile specific (relevant) circumstances between long-covid, and burnout/ depression?

So back to yourself atemerev (with no assumptions): can you speak to this at all?

Many thanks

[integrii]

I had COVID at the end of 2022 and became deeply and severely depressed right after and for the first several months of 2023. It was terrible. I was shaking uncontrollably for days, I never slept for more than a few minutes at a time, I didn't eat, and I had panic attacks constantly. I really thought that it would never end and that my brain had somehow broken.

I did have stressful events I was dealing with in life before this occurred, but I was managing. While I had COVID, I realized that I would get very unexpectedly sad and sometimes cry for no reason. As COVID got better, my depression symptoms stayed and got worse.

I ended up sick with something that required antibiotics and within a week of taking those, my symptoms started to ease up. A month later I was doing much better. A few months later and I was back to normal. I also started therapy during this depression event and continue it today just in case.

I really don't have a way to prove that it was connected to COVID or the antibiotic use, but I can tell you that my mind was not functioning correctly during this. I could mentally know everything was totally fine, but my body would still decide to dump adrenaline and fear on me unreasonably. It was like being trapped in a broken body that was torturing me. People would try to tell me that everything was fine, and I would explain that I knew that, but my brain chemistry was still on fire and logic didn't help.

Anyway, I fought hard, I reached out to friends, I did therapy as often as I could, I started exercising, did breathing exercises, took lots of walks outside, and I eventually got through it. It felt hopeless but I just did those things anyway through sheer force of will. Eventually I got through it and that hell is only a memory now that continues to fade with time.

I believe this was related to some kind of inflammation somewhere that was linked to a very bad COVID infection.

[jacquesm]

Much strength to you!

[johnchristopher]

This is weird. If you don't mind my asking, why don't you google for studies with larger scale experiments/surveys rather than using a single random data point ?

Edit: yeah, that's what I thought...

[aeim]

huh?

[somedude895]

I also wonder the role social contagion has in it all. Not to detract from the issues GP or others in here are reporting, but most if not all symptoms of long covid could potentially be psychosomatic. Of the people I know who suffered longterm effects like this, every single one had very stressful jobs / lives or a lot of anxiety previous to infection.

I'm also reminded of my mother who suffered from electromagnetic hypersensitivity and would shut off the wifi at night because she couldn't sleep. Years later her general situation has changed to the better due to certain developments in her life, and the issue has since disappeared completely and the wifi hums on happily during the night now, with her sleep having improved significantly overall. That's all to say that we know social contagion and psychosomatism are a thing.

Unfortunately it's very difficult to have this discussion because some people won't even consider this possibility and default to painting skeptics as inhumane brutes.

[aeim]

covid is brutal. so is burnout. i reject the term psychosomatic in relation to what i'm pointing at, in either case

[Reubend]

It seems to me like you're thinking of depression and anxiety as the main symptoms of long COVID, but that's not the case.

Issues with short term memory, breathing issues, and sleep issues are the most common symptoms.

I think burnout is unlikely to be the main cause of these symptoms, particularly when it comes to respiratory symptoms.

[aeim]

no

not all circumstances of all cases – and to be clear, covid is brutal, so is burnout. remember though, they aren't mutually exclusive

i've heard some speak of long-covid symptoms as if burnout, without other respiratory concerns. and given numbers of sufferers of both, there must be many who have experienced burnout before covid, so already make a distinction

where symptoms overlap, and circumstances align, the simplest explanation for those overlapping symptoms, might be the aligned circumstances; and anything we can do to simplify the problem space is worth exploring, in parallel, of course