This post is a collection of selected written blogs, articles, podcasts and videos about my journey with the illness and the recovery.
Written blog posts
For 7 weeks I have been through a roller coaster of ill health, extreme emotions, and utter exhaustion
May 5, 2020
Paul Garner, professor of infectious diseases at Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine, discusses his experience of having covid-19. In mid March I developed covid-19. For almost seven weeks I have been through a roller coaster of ill health, extreme emotions, and utter exhaustion…
Covid-19 and fatigue—a game of snakes and ladders
May 19, 2020
It’s over, I thought! It was the beginning of May, after the weirdest seven weeks of illness I had ever had, a roller coaster of exhaustion, pain everywhere, tinnitus, headaches, and fog: I felt remarkably well, almost high. The aches had gone, my mind was alive, the sun was out.
Covid-19 at 14 weeks—phantom speed cameras, unknown limits, and harsh penalties
June 23, 2020
“If my husband had said he was still sick with covid-19 after a month, I’d say he was milking it.” Straight talking from a Liverpudlian woman on one of my WhatsApp groups in April when I had been ill for a month; what would she say to me now at 95 days?
On long haul covid-19—Don’t try to dominate this virus, accommodate it
September 4, 2020
“Has covid-19 gone?” My first thought every morning for six months. A few weeks ago, I was jubilant. The muscle aches had evaporated, my head was clear. I announced this to Rachael, a friend who knows chronic fatigue well. “Fantastic, Paul. You have found your baseline.” Crestfallen, I realised this was not the end; it was the end of the beginning.
Long covid and self-help pacing groups—getting by with a little help from our friends
September 29, 2020
Being ill is a lonely business, and worse with covid-19. Locked away from friends, no collegial coffee breaks, no face to face medical consultations, and a television full of Orwellian government briefings. Add symptoms that your friends don’t quite believe; fatigue that doctors have framed as psychosomatic; and the poison of post-exertional malaise with no advice on NHS or NICE websites. The isolation is complete.
Paul Garner: on his recovery from long covid
January 25, 2021
We need to listen to communities of people who have recovered from illness, says Paul Garner. I loved my job, had good friends, and felt as high as a kite on life. Then I got covid-19, and nothing prepared me for what happened next.
If you have long Covid, as I did, don’t give up hope. Recovery is possible
10 June, 2021
It’s different for everyone. In my case, finding an explanation for my symptoms that made sense was the key.
This explanation of Long Covid helped me overcome my hellish struggle with the illness
24 March 2025
Professor Paul Garner, a specialist in infectious diseases, was ‘beaten up’ by Long Covid for around 10 months, then he was given an explanation that transformed his life
