I'm a scientist. I think accordingly I like numbers and stats. Those stats are often hard to come by during things like a pandemic, because science is often slow.

So, while I read a lot of studies and journals about what's going on in the world, one of the first things I did as I realized what *could* be happening was to start reading personal accounts wherever I could. One of the places that I keep in my mind daily is the long haulers sub on reddit. Every day I remind myself about the human toll by reading their, often jarringly, personal takes.

In that vain, I've been thinking a lot lately about the people I know and care for. My wife and I have never kept a very large social circle. It's just not the type of people we are. But, we have some family nearby and a handful of friends and coworkers with whom we keep in touch.

I'd like to share some generic info about the people we are closest to and what I'm really curious about is:

Is our experience unusual? Are you seeing something similar?

All anecdotal, of course. I'm not looking for a scientific, case study on the people around you. Just, generally, is this the way the world is now?

First up, my father. He's in his 70's, so some decline isn't unexpected. However, he's always been a very active person with a sharp mind. In his own words, since his 2nd COVID infection recently, he's "not up to much of anything" physically, and has absolutely crushing brain fog. I don't know if I've ever known someone who's read as many books as he has, but, he just can't at this point.

Continuing with family, my wife's parents. My mother in-law was never the healthiest person. It's hard to tease out her longterm issues from her more recent, but, cognitively she never had issues until recently. Now she's basically exactly what you see in the movies when they're trying to show you that someone's begging the decent into dementia. My father in-law had zero health issues until this year and now has cancer. COVID related from T-cell issues or not at all related there's no way to tell.

My wife's best friend since they were kids is clearly the lucky one here. She locked herself down for two years, never went anywhere without a mask and then at the beginning of this year just decided to be done with all of that. She's travelled around the country to weddings and restaurants and swears she's as healthy as ever and never even got sick this year. I take her at her word.

My best friend, on the other hand, also was extremely cautious for a couple of years and then decided he was over it early this year. He's a veteran and hasn't missed his morning run, rain, sleet or snow, for decades....until he got COVID. Afterward he physically couldn't any longer. All of his joints hurt. He was diagnosed with autoimmune, or rheumatoid, arthritis. Now, if you ask him COVID has absolutely nothing to do with it. It was just a coincidence, and, again, I'm not here to argue that. I'm talking strictly anecdotal experiences here.

Another friend of mine is a really smart scientific mind. He's a science teacher and decided early on that he was going to go through whatever happened while in the classroom. I don't know exactly how many COVID infections he's had, let's just call it multiple. Neither him, his wife, nor their two kids can get healthy at this point. He's missed over 50% of his work days this semester, his kids are never able to go to daycare or school, and it's just one infection after another. The flu, croup, RSV, colds, COVID, etc. In his own words he just "can't get healthy. It's like my immune system doesn't work anymore" but he, also, believes it has nothing to do with COVID. Not that he has an explanation, but, clearly not COVID in his mind.

My wife's friend, also a teacher, has had an almost identical experience. Without belaboring the point, she is sick all of the time. Sadly, her little kid, now 2, has spent half of her life constantly sick. Just last week she was telling my wife that all she wanted was for them to be healthy for 2 weeks. Just 2 weeks and maybe they could have a good Christmas. They haven't managed 2 weeks once this semester. So what happened? This morning she was practically sobbing to my wife that they're sick, again, and she's far too sick to make it in to teach today.