By Khari Smart\/\/<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There I was sitting in the waiting room of an urgent care, waiting for a nurse to call me back to an exam room. I wasn\u2019t thrilled knowing that I had to get what seemed like my one-hundredth COVID test this semester, but I was kind of glad it would give me answers to how I had been feeling the past couple of days. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
On the morning of Oct. 26, I woke up from a very strange fever dream that involved one of my long-time friends being the leader of a cult. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I wish I could explain more but I couldn\u2019t even comprehend it. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
All I knew is that when I woke up, I felt off. Initially, I couldn’t put my finger on it, but as the day went on, a headache began to get increasingly more painful. I frequently get dehydrated, so I just tried to pass this headache off as my not drinking enough water that day. But in the back of my head, I knew it didn’t feel the same.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
That night I went to bed hoping that I\u2019d feel better the next day. Unfortunately, that was not the case. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I woke up the next morning in a sweat with a sore throat and the same headache. The first thing I did was hop out of bed and grab my thermometer out of my PPE kit the school had provided us when we moved in. I popped it in my mouth, hoping my temperature would come back with something in the 98 degrees range like it should. I was sitting in my bed when the thermometer started to beep. I took it out. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
100 degrees flat.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I let out a big sigh and went back to bed hoping I could just sleep it off. Once I woke up a couple of hours later feeling the same, I did what most people my age do when they feel sick, start frantically searching on Google. Unfortunately, in today\u2019s world anytime you Google any type of cold or flu-like symptom you get something about it possibly being COVID thrown in your face. It\u2019s not the best for giving you hope. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
After some extensive research, I told my roommate that I was feeling under the weather and wanted to get tested just to be sure that whatever was going on wasn\u2019t serious. Thankfully, he agreed, and we went to a local urgent care and got tested. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Disclaimer: no matter how many times you get tested for COVID, it doesn\u2019t become any more bearable. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
After my test, I spent the rest of the week self-isolating just in case. Toward the end of the week, I started to feel better, but thenFriday hit. I woke up and hopped in the shower and after a couple of minutes, I realized I couldn’t smell my body wash. Panic hit. I got out of my shower and went to brush my teeth. To my surprise I couldn’t taste my toothpaste either.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In my head sirens were going off everywhere. I had felt like I was getting better but then out of the blue I was hit with the nail in the coffin.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Later that day my roommate received a call telling him his test results came back negative. That gave me a lot of hope, but it wouldn\u2019t last long. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
On Saturday morning I got the call that my test had come back positive. As you can imagine I wasn\u2019t thrilled because I knew what was coming next. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Isolation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I called the Wellness Center and went through the process, speaking to a variety of people about what was going to happen next. I had to speak with Dr. Kolb, Thomas Chatfield, Teresa Cevallos, the school\u2019s contact tracer as well the state of Maryland\u2019s contract tracer. They told me I would be going into 10-day isolation and I needed to start packing clothes and anything else I\u2019d need.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A couple of hours later I received a text to head over to the 7th Street duplexes. With this being my fourth year at Hood, I can shamefully say I\u2019ve never been there, so I didn’t know what to expect. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
When I arrived, I was greeted by a school staff member who instructed me that it was just me in the house but there was a possibility that other people may end up there as well. I spent the first couple of hours setting up my room and exploring the house. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
To my surprise, it is a lot bigger than it looks on the outside, but probably because it\u2019s just me here. One thing that stuck out to me was that they left a puzzle on the dining room table. It was a 500-piece glow-in-the-dark puzzle of colorful seahorses. I had not done a puzzle in years and spent most of the first night trying to do it. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I can tell you now that I\u2019m four days in, it\u2019s still just me, and I gave up on the puzzle.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In my defense, it\u2019s a hard puzzle. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
As I\u2019m finishing out my fourth day, boredom has begun to set in, and the lack of face-to-face communication is starting to get old. I look out the window each day to see the world still spinning and people still living their lives getting their coffee from the Dunkin across the street.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
At this point, it almost feels like purgatory but I\u2019m almost at the halfway mark so I\u2019ll live. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
On the bright side, I feel significantly better and today was the first day I could taste the food I was eating. Never thought I would say it, but I do miss the dining hall food. The options I\u2019m given aren\u2019t the best. But until I can rejoin society, I will be trying to make the best out of the remaining time I have here in my \u201cCOVID Bachelor Pad.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n
To everyone on campus and at home, stay safe, and stay healthy because this is not where you want to be. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"