"I didn't want to live." Three stories of post-Covid complications: insomnia, depression and distortion of smells

“I couldn’t eat food properly for weeks because it smelled rotten.”

Alla Chikinda, coordinator of the LGBT* Resource Center:

— On November 3 last year, my sense of smell disappeared, and I realized that I was sick with Covid. I didn’t feel any tastes or smells until mid-December. This greatly affected my life - I burned food several times while cooking, and once I almost burned down the house because my oven mitt caught fire: I stood with my back to the stove and didn’t feel anything. By the New Year I felt better, and soon the symptoms went away completely.

At the beginning of February, my girlfriend and I ordered food from Khmeli Suneli. I was shocked because I couldn’t eat either pumpkin soup or dolma, which are my favorite dishes. My first thought: the restaurant has gone bad and they gave me stale food. The feeling was exactly that: something spoiled with a foulbrood taste. Surprisingly, my girlfriend was fine and ate dinner. That evening I decided to move on with my life, having become disillusioned with Khmeli Suneli.

But the next morning the strange smells returned. It seemed like someone was always smoking nearby, and for me the smell of tobacco was one of the most disgusting. I couldn't drink coffee, then I ignored lunch. I felt anxious: I didn’t understand what was happening. When I hadn’t eaten normally for the third day, I went to a psychologist, who gave me simple advice: “Google it!” That’s how I learned about parosmia - when people’s smells are distorted after Covid.

I calmed down and realized that I was not alone by joining thematic groups on Facebook. But the problem was not solved, because everything frankly stank. Perhaps, I could only calmly eat cucumbers and baby puree; the rest caused a gag reflex. In addition to food, almost all household chemicals and cosmetics smelled disgusting. I spent hours looking in stores for creams that didn’t smell moldy; the consultants looked at me very strangely.

Parosmia cannot be treated; it goes away on its own over time. However, on social networks, people recommend a variety of ways to alleviate this condition, ranging from acupuncture. I saw a video where people with parosmia are advised to put one hand on their nose and ask another person to click the back of their head. Some - imagine! — it helped, but I’m not one of them. Even essential oils, which are supposed to train the sense of smell, had no effect. But I didn’t go to doctors because I don’t really trust them: I had many negative situations during contact with Russian healthcare.

Today I'm feeling better and I'm expanding the list of foods I can eat. But all this is unstable: today the bananas are booming, but tomorrow you don’t even want to get close to them because of the bad smell. However, before I couldn’t calmly walk past bakeries and fast food shops, now I don’t feel such disgust. Despite this, I haven’t enjoyed eating for a very long time.

The quality of life has decreased greatly, and I am very sad to admit it: I never thought that I would be so dependent on food. All smells were distorted in a bad way. I am constantly surrounded by something unpleasant, and it affects my psychological state. I once cried at dinner at Maccheroni because I couldn't eat my favorite dessert. I still don’t eat chocolate, which I consider one of the important things in my life. With the onset of hot weather, I was faced with the problem that it is very difficult to find ice cream without chocolate.

When my distortions began, I began to notice the smell of sweat and bad breath more often. Since many foods are still inedible for me and also have a strong smell, it is very difficult for me to be around well-fed people. The first two months were the hardest - I couldn’t be closer than arm’s length to anyone, and hugging was simply impossible.

What to do if you don't want to live?

If thoughts about suicide are very urgent, then you are an incorrigible egoist. At least that's what many experts say. After all, the death of a person always causes suffering among those around him. Is it possible for a non-selfish person to want to hurt so many people at once?

If you do not consider yourself selfish, then it is worth taking a number of steps. All of them should directly depend on the prerequisites of your situation.

• If you cannot improve your life or personal relationships, you should go to see a psychologist. In fact, a large number of people seem to consciously want something, but subconsciously set themselves an incredible number of blocks. Let's give an example of one patient who wanted to start a family and even registered on a dating site. However, at the reception it turned out that she constantly “unexpectedly finds” a huge number of excuses to avoid meeting a potential “worthwhile man”, going on dates with those who are obviously not suitable for her. When identifying the root causes, a negative childhood experience was discovered, when her older brother, who was a special authority for her, treated his wife very rudely and unceremoniously, criticized her figure after childbirth and even stooped to assault. This developed a very negative subconscious image, which forced me to avoid emotional attachment. Although outwardly she expressed in every possible way her readiness to start a family, have a child, and even lamented that she was so unlucky. “Gender minimums” imposed by society can be very harmful to self-esteem, so it is better to discuss such problems with a psychologist.
• Sometimes it’s still worth deciding to make drastic changes. And a person just needs to help with this. Yes, you are so tired of work, your loved one and the whole situation that you don’t want to live, but is it scary to change the situation? Let's be honest: if it comes to thoughts of suicide, then you should still make up your mind and give up everything. Sometimes this opens up such prospects and such euphoria that thoughts of death immediately disappear by themselves.
• If you have everything in this life, then it’s worth finding a new interest, and one that never occurred to you. Go on a trip around the world, devote time to a global problem: save animals, build shelters, fight epidemics. Or you can just get yourself a pet who will sincerely and unselfishly love you always and everywhere.
• In general, pets, hobbies and travel are three panaceas for the desire to leave this life. They return the joy and meaning of life, the taste for new experiences, the feeling of need and necessity. Moreover, all this expands the circle of communication, and there are new interesting acquaintances.
• But if suicidal tendencies are associated with hormonal fluctuations, you can seek help from a specialist. But, in addition to drug intervention, it is worth understanding that such a mood is your companion for a certain period. You can talk to your depression like you would an old friend. You now know for sure that the devaluation of your existence is her doing. As an addition, art therapy helps a lot because it can express feelings, thus reducing the desire for suicide.
• But a loved one can help older people. After all, the system and political structure are changing, but if children and grandchildren visit the elderly, listening to their stories and telling them how valuable they are and that without them there would be no younger generation, our grandparents will never want to give up their lives and won't get depressed.

“I suffered from post-Covid insomnia for more than three months”

Maria Zakharova, head of the national editorial office of the Shkulev Media Holding Network of City Portals:

“I fell ill with Covid immediately after the New Year and spent sick leave until the end of January. For the first 15 days the temperature ranged from 36.9 to 37.5. In addition to the fact that I could not feel tastes and smells, my nasopharynx was very swollen, so I could hardly hear and lived as if in an aquarium. All this time I was at home, and every week I was called by volunteers from the operational headquarters, who spoke Russian poorly, checked the symptoms against their list, but could not help me in any way.

My boyfriend and I were sick; we were both in quarantine. Just then the New Year holidays were going on, the sense of time was blurred, and we didn’t really bother about the regime - we could stay awake at night and chat about different things. One day I caught myself thinking that it was already 6 am, he was sleeping, but I was still not there. And this continues day after day: towards the morning I fall asleep, toss and turn for a couple of hours and get up.

Insomnia manifested itself in different ways: either I did not sleep at all, or I lay all night with my eyes closed, and my brain was working - I reacted to sounds and did not lose my sense of time. The first two weeks I felt relatively normal because I was staying at home. If I got tired, I went to bed and just looked at the ceiling.

It became not funny at all when insomnia began to affect work. I just didn't understand anything. I came to my workplace, turned on the monitor and plugged it in. An hour later I caught myself thinking that I was just looking at one point. At work, I also have to make operational decisions, but insomnia has killed this function. When I once gave a note to a proofreader, they unfolded it to me with the words: “Mash, you have the same last name written differently in three paragraphs.”

Even when I was discharged after Covid, I complained to the therapist about sleep disturbances. She prescribed sleeping pills for five days to normalize the regime. After taking it, I slept normally, but did not recover well - my coordination was impaired. Before an important business trip, the insomnia returned, and I decided to continue taking the pills. In the end, I drank the entire tube, but quickly realized that I was going too far and refused the medicine. I suffered like this all February.

Then I found a somnologist, he already sent me to a psychiatrist, who confirmed that sleep disturbance was not a consequence of some of my experiences, but a lesion of the nervous system. That is why sedative techniques and sleep hygiene did not help me - the problem was not anxiety. They selected me a drug from the group of nootropics, which is released according to a strict prescription. The pills didn’t take effect immediately, there was no sleep for the first two days, but my body was under a tranquilizer: I literally looked at the ceiling all night and drooled. However, this soon passed and sleep improved.

I used to always wonder when parties and 24-hour work would leave my life. The universe heard me, but in its own way - with the help of insomnia. All these months my relatives and some friends knew about my problem. For example, I came to a birthday party, got up from the table at nine in the evening and said: “That’s it, I’m off to bed!” And they understood me. Strict sleep hygiene has appeared: after 23:00, no social networks or gadgets, phone on silent mode. I try to rest and think first of all about my health. Covid has reset my athletic performance to zero: the form I had been working on for months before is gone, and I’m still working on it. At the beginning of May, my treatment ended—hopefully, for good. I can fall asleep on my own and sleep for 6-8 hours, waking up a couple of times a night at most.

Reasons for such thoughts

1. Man is a social being, and many so-called “norms” are imposed on us by society. For example, one of the most common imposed “necessities” are gender minimums. For example, a woman must be married and have a child by twenty-five. And by the age of thirty, a man is directly obliged to have an apartment, a car and a job that he can brag about. If such a “minimum” is not achieved, society is inclined to believe that not everything is in order with the person. And it doesn’t matter that the individual is not at all interested in all this. But the situation is worse when such “accepted norms” are actually perceived by the individual as their own. But it’s impossible to implement them. That’s when a feeling of hopelessness and unwillingness to live arises.
2. Saturation with benefits. Second extreme. It seems that she has achieved everything, she has everything: the house is full, the wife is beautiful, the children are gold, a mistress, a car, an apartment, a dacha, a bank account... But there is emptiness in my soul. The most important thing is lost - the drive and meaning to get out of bed every day. And if there is no incentive, then the realization of futility comes.
3. Running in a closed circle. Sometimes life develops in such a way that it begins to resemble running in a vicious circle. Unfortunately, from childhood we are taught “what to do.” But they don’t tell you at all how to rest properly. So it turns out that a person does not know how to set priorities and cannot stop. And personal rest is constantly perceived by him or is regarded by those around him as an unaffordable and inappropriate benefit. “Why are you sitting down if the dishes haven’t been washed, the clothes haven’t been ironed, the apartment hasn’t been cleaned, haven’t...” The body is depleted without being fully restored. In addition, often in such situations there is a ban on “emotional outlets”: hobbies, entertainment, pleasant communication. Well, pray tell, what kind of gatherings can there be with a friend if the window is not washed at all for the third time in a month? Consequently, there is a deficit of positivity and emotional restoration. Naturally, at this rate, a woman (although, objectively speaking, a man too) loses a sense of significance and value, and therefore ceases to want to live further.
4. Severe psychotrauma. Personal illness and illness of loved ones, death, betrayal, breakup, divorce, financial turmoil, dismissal - all these are very strong personal stresses that can have a serious impact on a person’s condition. The personality loses a part of itself, its point of support. The world is turning upside down and the value of life is being rethought. I really want to stop the emotional suffering. This also includes age-related changes, when older people cease to experience the joy of life due to changing values ​​in society. For example, a change in the system, way of life, a decrease in respect for the merits of past wars, all this also knocks out a kind of fulcrum and contributes to the development of depressive and suicidal thoughts.
5. Hormonally caused depression. But sometimes there is no reason for such thoughts at first glance. But they are still present. Such situations arise during periods of hormonal changes: after difficult childbirth, during menopause (sometimes before or during menstrual bleeding) or during adolescence. Unfortunately, hormonal fluctuations can affect our mood and well-being. By the way, the opinion that men are not characterized by such fluctuations is currently being actively revised. And, if the visible signs of menopause in men are not so pronounced, hormonal changes still occur.

“I fell into depression out of the blue and cried non-stop”

Elizaveta Bozova, student, blogger:

— After moving from Yekaterinburg to St. Petersburg last fall, I suffered from Covid, and surprisingly easily - only with a runny nose and slight dizziness. A few days later, the smells disappeared, but this is not the main thing - the emotional state sharply worsened.

It happened literally out of the blue. Everything was fine in my life, but it was as if I started looking for something to be upset about. I could get hysterical over my choice of tights. All October I was depressed by basic things, but I tried to pretend that everything was normal.

Soon there was a sharp emotional decline. I started having problems sleeping, I broke up with my boyfriend, stopped studying and quit my job related to fitness. I remember how we were supposed to shoot a promotional video for my studio, but the day before I had an attack - my back suddenly hurt and I just collapsed on the floor. These were problems with psychosomatics. Then I went to the doctor and found out that I had a crushed intervertebral disc. Because of this, I couldn't work anymore.

The last straw was filming an interview with a psychologist for my YouTube channel. We recorded the video at night, for ten hours straight. When I returned home at 11 am, went to bed and woke up in the afternoon, I began to cry - and remained in this state for several days.

Throughout my life, I have often faced difficult situations, but I have never had anything like this, so I chalked it all up to post-Covid. I bought air tickets, got ready and flew home to the Urals - I thought that my friends would help me cope. But when we were sitting at the table in Yekaterinburg, they joked and talked to each other, and I looked at the floor because I didn’t want anything.

I went to a psychologist, but that only made things worse. She advised me to fly back to St. Petersburg and try to get my relationship back. I listened, and it was the bravest and stupidest act of my life: I spent my last money and came to nowhere. It was on New Year's Eve: I had no friends, no boyfriend, no money. In short, I won’t go to a psychologist anymore.

One of the personal growth marathons on the Internet saved me. At that moment, he was the only way out of the situation. The marathon helped me structure my thoughts and understand that my emotional decline was largely far-fetched and unfounded. I was able to put everything in order and start living again. At the end of March everything got better.

Praise yourself

In Abraham Maslow's A Theory of Human Motivation pyramid of needs, one of the top tiers is the need for respect and recognition. For a person to feel good, it is very important to know that he is valued and that his deeds are important and meaningful. From school, if not from kindergarten, we get used to expecting praise from other people, and not from ourselves.

And we consider achievements only what can be measured, evaluated and presented to others - a promotion at work, buying a car, receiving a diploma. But many, at first glance, small steps that make up our path to great success remain unnoticed.

John Croft, an ecologist who spent many years studying the life and philosophy of the Australian Aborigines, together with his colleagues came up with Dragon dreaming - a method of planning personal and corporate projects. He believes that there should be four processes in life - dreaming, planning, doing and celebrating. And without the last thing - celebration - the cycle remains incomplete, we do not feel pleasure and recognition.

Any steps - even those that seem tiny to us - are worth celebrating, not devaluing.

Preparing a delicious and balanced lunch may seem like a piece of cake at first glance. But if you take a closer look, this is one of the elements that makes up the health of the whole family. Half a page of text might seem like very little, but at this rate you can write a whole book in a year.

For those who are tired, confused and unsure of themselves, it is especially important to celebrate achievements - both big and small, everyday. As an option, keep a success diary and write down at least five things every day for which you can praise yourself. Even what we are used to not noticing is counted - routine household chores and work tasks.

This practice will help you feel important and find a source of recognition and praise within yourself, rather than expecting it from other people. And of course, no one is stopping you from pampering yourself with entertainment and pleasant purchases, or making it a rule to regularly celebrate successes with your family or friends.

Believe in yourself