I recently contracted the SARS-CoV-2 virus, with my symptoms starting on June 15 and my first positive tests (1 PCR and 1 rapid antigen) on June 17. I had attended a college reunion on the weekend June 11-12, which was a large gathering of hundreds of people. The event was almost entirely outside, but people were often very close together. The event lines up when I developed symptoms, and my family who attended the event with me also developed symptoms at the same time as me, even though we parted on June 13, so I heavily suspect that this event is where I contracted the virus.
During June 13-15, I did not experience any noticable symptoms.
On the night of June 15, I began to have a cough and a mild fever. I went to sleep feeling very hot and congested, so I needed to blow my nose constantly and prop myself up to sleep so that my nose did not clog completely.
On the morning of June 16, I woke up feeling fine – the fever had passed and I only had very mild congestion. So, I thought that whatever it was must have passed and I went to work (I commute to work at an office) as usual. When I got home from work that day, I started to have more severe symptoms. I developed a sore throat, a mild headache, and the congestion was back. This was the worst I felt during my sickness. I didn’t feel very bad – I’ve been sick with the seasonal flu much worse many times before – but I could tell that it was not over with like I had thought that morning. I decided I would work form home the next day and also go to a testing center to get a PCR test. All the symptoms I had were consistent with COVID-19, so I thought it was likely. I slept fine that night, though with mild congestion.
On the morning of June 17, I felt the same as the night before except my headache was gone. I went to the testing center to take a PCR test. I would get the results of this test in about 24 hours. When I got back to my house, I notified my landlord (who is an older man) that I was concerned I may have COVID-19, and he offered me a rapid antigen test kit. I tested positive on this test, and so started my quarantine. I asked my family if they had any symptoms, and they mentioned that my dad had developed a sore throat as well. They all then took rapid antgen tests and he tested positive. I felt very mild symptoms for the rest of the day, and slept fine.
On June 18 my symptoms were slightly less severe. My mild congestion and sore throat persisted.
On June 19 my symptoms were almost gone. My congestion was gone, and my sore throat manifested as about two short coughing sessions during the day.
One June 20 my symptoms were entirely gone. I still had a little big of phlegm in my throat that I spit up about two times during the day, but I didn’t need to cough. According to the CDC reccomendations, this was to be my last day of quarantine if I continued to lack symptoms. I decided to work from home one more time the next day just to be sure, but I figured I was safe to go out and buy groceries, etc. as normal as long as I wore a mask. My plan was to return to the office on June 22.
On June 22, I successfully returned to my normal office-going work schedule. I wore a surgical mask while in the office and public areas until June 26 (which is the end of the 10-day period that the CDC reccomended to continue wearing a mask after developing symptoms).
As on July 9, I have not, at far as I can tell, experienced any “long COVID” symptoms, such as brain fog.