It turns out you can relapse from the flu

It’s been a ruff month for yours truly.

A few weeks ago I came down with some vague influenza-like illness that gave me a headache, low-grade fever, achy legs that made it impossible to stand for more than a few minutes at a time, and that strange behind-the-eyes soreness. No respiratory symptoms, so that ruled out the new plague.

Anyway, I got better-ish in a few days, but I guess not better enough. Last Thursday night I was jolted from my sleep by the severest attack of the chills I’ve ever had. Shivered uncontrollably for an hour. After fitfully sleeping through the rest of the night I woke up to a headache/behind-the-eyes ache a couple orders of magnitude more powerful than the one I’d had before, more severe soreness throughout my body, and a higher fever. Like the same shit had come back but worse.

I dragged myself back to the doctor, who said it probably recurred because I was too eager to head back to work and the gym, threw Panadol at me, and told me to go to bed.

I’ve very slowly been feeling better since, so I guess the worst is over. But I’m pretty taken aback by this whole idea that the flu can go away and then come back just to beat my ass harder. I’ve never heard of such a thing before.

Has anyone else had this experience?

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Hasn’t happened to me with the flu, but when I was a kid I had the mumps, recovered then developed it again within a week.

I remember when I was a kid, sleeping at my sisters place. Woke up with chills and stuff. My bro-in-law gave me a shot of whiskey and sent me back to bed. Turns out I like whiskey. :face_with_monocle:

Sorry, probably not much help to you :neutral_face:

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Looking this up returned images of children with bulging bullfrog necks…

Ah, I was vaccinated against this in the US. The MMR vaccine. I guess that’s why I’ve never seen it.

When I was a kid in my country it was considered a mild disease so kids wouldn’t usually get a vaccine. You get sick once, stay home from school few days, develop the antibodies and carry on with your life. My body had to think about it twice. On a positive note, mumps is usually a fairly painful experience but I had no pain at all, just fever and throat aches. Go figure.

I don’t know how it’s handled now, though. Many vaccinations for mild/infancy diseases that doctors suggested to avoid when I was a kid, in order to let bodies develop the immune system naturally, are now often mandatory or highly recommended.

Yes, I had this with a cold not the flu. It came back when I was tired. It dragged on and on. I eventually got enough rest and good food. I took Ibuprofen for the headaches with an anti acid. Panadol did not touch it.

Do we need to Press F for you, dear @Hanna?

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Take care Hanna, rest more.

Do rest. Wish you a speedy recovery.

BTW, reminder to all: the presence of COVID19 has not scared other bugs away. Yours truly got a stomach one, doc says it has been going around since New Year.

So guys and gals, rest more, take vitamins, laugh more, build immunity.

Did you by chance take a shower before going to bed? And if so, did you fully dry your hair? Do you sleep with the AC on?

A long time ago: I had a similar experience with shivering uncontrollably. Except mine was due to me falling asleep with wet hair in an air conditioned room with the AC set at 18C. I learned to never do that again.

Naw, this is definitely flu. The sudden onset of severe symptoms was the main tip-off. I went from normal to sick as a dog over the course of an hour. Since then it’s just felt like trying to recover from being beaten up and then run over.

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Apple Cider Vinegar helps me when I’m feeling under the weather.

https://www.organicauthority.com/health/how-to-use-apple-cider-vinegar-to-prevent-and-treat-colds-and-the-flu

I don’t know if that’s the flu again,maybe.
But the first description you have were exactly the symptoms I had of the flu this year. The flu that has been going around this year was really rough. In fact it was the worst flu I ever experienced .

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The only other time I had flu it felt about this bad and lasted this long, too. Small wonder this shit can kill people, or at least make you wish you were dead.

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I had similar symptoms around Christmas/january… I kept wondering if it was in fact COVID-19 or something.

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For most virus infections all we could do is rest.

It occurred to me too, but with no cough and not even a sore throat the doctor ruled that out pretty quickly.

I keep wondering the same thing. In some cases the symptoms are mild or none at all. Last week I had a sore throat but no fever or headache. However, that sore throat was very nasty . Like someone had put a cheese grater down my throat. The doctor said it was just a cold :thinking:

Could also be allergies or pollution. Both can greatly irritate the throat without actually causing an illness.

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Me too. Started with a very sharp pain low in my lungs, just under my sternum. For 24 hours that was the only symptom (I felt great), but I could feel a remarkably strong cytokine response building. Went on to a dry cough, lots of sinus congestion. The cytokine response eventually put me to bed for about 48 hours (with some chills). Felt like shit for about two weeks.

I suspect it was Covid19 or a very close relative. Had returned from Bangkok about 60 hours before symptoms set in. While a cytokine response that results in long sleep runs in in my family, I’ve never experienced such sharp pain in my lungs before in my life.