Personal Experience with COVID?

[pylon]

I never got Covid thankfully (at least never tested positive), and I've probably taken 150+ tests as I have worked in a car dealership through the whole thing. I was triple vaxxed, all Pfizer.

Unfortunately, I wasn't good at connecting dots. After my first shot, my heart was racing like crazy about a week after. Chalked it up to stress and dealing with the absolute worst and most entitled of humanity. Those of us that didn't have the luxury to work from home, got to see sides of people on a daily basis that was very ugly, and stressful. But I quickly got used to it and put the blinders on. I simply stopped being bothered by it, and just realized that humanity sucks.

After the second shot, within a week, my heart started intermittently racing again, I was hitting 170-180 BPM sitting at my desk, and ended up in the ER. After 2-3 weeks the episodes stopped, and I was told it was a merely 'likely a coincidence. These are stressful times'.

Shot 3, same thing after 6 days, and now I am diagnosed with AFib. I have episodes from time time time, and it's likely with me for life.

Good luck trying to apply for Vaccine injury compensation. No doctor even wants to consider signing off on it, as they were all virtue signalling the safety of the vaccine and berating anyone wanting to question the potential risks. They then go on to tell you that your ECG results are likely psychosomatic and stress related when you have had absolutely perfect heart health up until the jabs. Covid is so far down the list of stressful things I have dealt with in my life, it's almost laughable.

In hindsight, I would have not been vaccinated and just further isolated myself to protect others. Even if that meant quitting my job. I could have dealt with a nasty cold/flu a couple times instead of damaging my heart for the rest of my life. But here we are, and nobody can provide any answers as to how to pursue compensation, found out if the vaccine damaged my heart, or even see if I am entitled to anything. The second you even suggest to any medical professional you think you have a vaccine injury, you'll get ghosted.

[Tacopuck]

Originally Posted by pylon

I never got Covid thankfully (at least never tested positive), and I've probably taken 150+ tests as I have worked in a car dealership through the whole thing. I was triple vaxxed, all Pfizer.

Unfortunately, I wasn't good at connecting dots. After my first shot, my heart was racing like crazy about a week after. Chalked it up to stress and dealing with the absolute worst and most entitled of humanity. Those of us that didn't have the luxury to work from home, got to see sides of people on a daily basis that was very ugly, and stressful. But I quickly got used to it and put the blinders on. I simply stopped being bothered by it, and just realized that humanity sucks.

After the second shot, within a week, my heart started intermittently racing again, I was hitting 170-180 BPM sitting at my desk, and ended up in the ER. After 2-3 weeks the episodes stopped, and I was told it was a merely 'likely a coincidence. These are stressful times'.

Shot 3, same thing after 6 days, and now I am diagnosed with AFib. I have episodes from time time time, and it's likely with me for life.

Good luck trying to apply for Vaccine injury compensation. No doctor even wants to consider signing off on it, as they were all virtue signalling the safety of the vaccine and berating anyone wanting to question the potential risks. They then go on to tell you that your ECG results are likely psychosomatic and stress related when you have had absolutely perfect heart health up until the jabs. Covid is so far down the list of stressful things I have dealt with in my life, it's almost laughable.

In hindsight, I would have not been vaccinated and just further isolated myself to protect others. Even if that meant quitting my job. I could have dealt with a nasty cold/flu a couple times instead of damaging my heart for the rest of my life. But here we are, and nobody can provide any answers as to how to pursue compensation, found out if the vaccine damaged my heart, or even see if I am entitled to anything. The second you even suggest to any medical professional you think you have a vaccine injury, you'll get ghosted.

Sorry to hear this. Any chance you have an smartwatch with a HR monitor so you could trend your HR data upto and after each shot? (I assume you have record of the date and ~ time each shot was done)

[opendoor]

Originally Posted by pylon

Good luck trying to apply for Vaccine injury compensation. No doctor even wants to consider signing off on it, as they were all virtue signalling the safety of the vaccine and berating anyone wanting to question the potential risks. They then go on to tell you that your ECG results are likely psychosomatic and stress related when you have had absolutely perfect heart health up until the jabs. Covid is so far down the list of stressful things I have dealt with in my life, it's almost laughable.

In hindsight, I would have not been vaccinated and just further isolated myself to protect others. Even if that meant quitting my job. I could have dealt with a nasty cold/flu a couple times instead of damaging my heart for the rest of my life. But here we are, and nobody can provide any answers as to how to pursue compensation, found out if the vaccine damaged my heart, or even see if I am entitled to anything. The second you even suggest to any medical professional you think you have a vaccine injury, you'll get ghosted.

That hasn't been my experience. My wife had a pretty severe reaction a week after her 1st dose that could have been vaccine related, and her doctor and a neurologist both went through all the proper steps to document everything and report it to Health Canada. They were a bit annoyed because of the extra paperwork, but no one she encountered (multiple doctors and nurses, neurologist, medical resident working with the neurologist, etc.) was remotely dismissive about the potential of it being an adverse reaction to the vaccine.

If you've encountered multiple medical professionals who come to the same conclusion, it's likely that's their honest medical opinion rather than some sort of "virtue signalling". That doesn't mean they're not incorrect, but from their perspective the annual incidence rate of new-onset AFib for males in their 40s is something like 0.5%, so it's something they'll encounter pretty regularly.

AFib is certainly a possible side effect of both the vaccine and an infection, but no safety signals have really shown up to concretely draw a link, so it's still pretty rare based on the data. And when it comes to how common side effects are, the data is pretty clear. If vaccines were causing a high number of severe side effects in people, then it would show up in population-level data, but that hasn't been the case.

Some things are elevated in places (excess deaths being a big one), but in any age-adjusted data I've seen, it's generally the people with the most doses who have the lowest incidence, despite them generally being more vulnerable on average (people with comorbodities tend to have more doses).

And even if you think Canada's setup of manual reporting is a joke, other countries with much more modern medical reporting (where reports are automatically cross-referenced with a bunch of criteria to pick out patterns) aren't seeing much either. Myocarditis and Pericarditis are pretty clearly linked to mRNA vaccines (though they're rare), and there are slight risks for other things. But if you got AFib from the vaccine, chances are you were just very unlucky, rather than you being one of many who are being ignored by the medical community.

[pylon]

Originally Posted by opendoor

That hasn't been my experience. My wife had a pretty severe reaction a week after her 1st dose that could have been vaccine related, and her doctor and a neurologist both went through all the proper steps to document everything and report it to Health Canada. They were a bit annoyed because of the extra paperwork, but no one she encountered (multiple doctors and nurses, neurologist, medical resident working with the neurologist, etc.) was remotely dismissive about the potential of it being an adverse reaction to the vaccine.

If you've encountered multiple medical professionals who come to the same conclusion, it's likely that's their honest medical opinion rather than some sort of "virtue signalling". That doesn't mean they're not incorrect, but from their perspective the annual incidence rate of new-onset AFib for males in their 40s is something like 0.5%, so it's something they'll encounter pretty regularly.

AFib is certainly a possible side effect of both the vaccine and an infection, but no safety signals have really shown up to concretely draw a link, so it's still pretty rare based on the data. And when it comes to how common side effects are, the data is pretty clear. If vaccines were causing a high number of severe side effects in people, then it would show up in population-level data, but that hasn't been the case.

Some things are elevated in places (excess deaths being a big one), but in any age-adjusted data I've seen, it's generally the people with the most doses who have the lowest incidence, despite them generally being more vulnerable on average (people with comorbodities tend to have more doses).

And even if you think Canada's setup of manual reporting is a joke, other countries with much more modern medical reporting (where reports are automatically cross-referenced with a bunch of criteria to pick out patterns) aren't seeing much either. Myocarditis and Pericarditis are pretty clearly linked to mRNA vaccines (though they're rare), and there are slight risks for other things. But if you got AFib from the vaccine, chances are you were just very unlucky, rather than you being one of many who are being ignored by the medical community.

I've come to the conclusion nothing will come of it. I don't need or care about the money side of it. I am more interested in someone verifying what caused this in me, and have it on record. The timing of these A-fib episodes go beyond coincidence in my eyes, but as you said, because it is a reasonably common thing amongst men my age, I do not think anyone is willing to connect the dots or sign off on it. And I don't have enough recorded data to back it up outside of the week after the second shot where I was admitted to the hospital.

I would love a statistician to calculate the odds, of a man my age having nearly identical Afib episodes within 6-7 days of receiving a vaccine. My guess is it's in the millions. But I wouldn't even know what numbers you would use to calculate it.

Where I probably screwed things up for myself, is the episode a week after the third shot, my wife drove me to the hospital, and after 8 hours of waiting, we got up and left, because the bulk of the episode had subsided, and we were surrounded by a bunch of people coughing and wheezing in the waiting room. All they did was take my pulse and have me sit down. I didn't get an ECG that time as I never got a bed. It probably would have given me a good case based on the shot records etc. It did blow me away though, they let a guy in his mid-40s, sit in a waiting room with a resting pulse of 162 BPM. I would have thought that would have got you in pretty damn quick.

Regardless. At the beginning of the whole pandemic and when vaccines became available, I was one of the jerks berating and judging people for not getting vaccinated or wearing masks. Telling people to "Trust the science" and being quite an a-hole to anyone questioning getting it. Even lost a few friends over how militant my stance was. I've had to eat a lot of crow.

Although it is not 100% fact, I think the odds of me going through what I did, and the timing of it, make it pretty damn likely that I suffered lasting side effects from it. I have had zero heart issues in my life, and on my last physical in 2019, I was told I had the heart and blood work of a 20 year old, "Keep doing what you're doing, just try and drop 20 pounds."

By no stretch, am I an Anti-vaxxer. I do believe there was benefits to society as a whole. But knowing what I know now. And seeing how quick the medical community is to flick you away like a tinfoil hat wearing gnat when you bring up concerns that threaten their militant narrative.....I cannot honestly say I would have been vaccinated with what was an experimental technology. I do have to be that honest. I am glad others have seemed to have had luck getting answers, however that has not been my experience, not even remotely close.

[Fuzz]

If you are looking at odds of it happening from the vaccine, this paper:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9175153/

says it would be 315/523 million, or 1 in 2.43 million injections. Not doubting you, but I can see why doctors may consider other causes.

[RichieRich]

I directly know several people who had adverse reactions. Some debilitating, long term, and life altering. In all cases getting acknowledgement and help was extremely difficult. As with any medical issue seek help, self advocate, and be persistent to get the help you need. Hopefully this will pass and you’ll be back to normal health soon.

[opendoor]

Originally Posted by Fuzz

If you are looking at odds of it happening from the vaccine, this paper:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9175153/

says it would be 315/523 million, or 1 in 2.43 million injections. Not doubting you, but I can see why doctors may consider other causes.

Though that is based on VAERS data, which is pretty useless on its own. That said, a lot of European countries have fantastic data that automatically cross references between newly diagnosed conditions and the patient's background (including vaccination status) to detect these kinds of things over the population. That data properly generated safety signals for myocarditis and pericarditis after mRNA vaccination, but it hasn't shown a connection to AFib. So if it was just a case of medical professionals not wanting to acknowledge any risk from vaccination, then those wouldn't have come up either, but they did.

Given the timing, in pylon's case the vaccine and his AFib symptoms are undeniably related. But it doesn't necessarily follow from that that the vaccine doses caused the AFib. The exact mechanics of AFib and its symptoms aren't known for sure, but it's believed to be related to immune response. So it's plausible that someone could have subclinical AFib and then the strong immune response from a vaccine generates the symptoms.


All that said, I do think the narrative around COVID vaccines and their safety profile was unhelpful and short-sighted. It was clear from the studies alone that they were more poorly tolerated than most routine vaccines and had a higher rate of side effects. The benefit still clearly outweighed the risk for almost every age group, but there's little good that comes from not being up front and honest.

So in my wife's case, the neurologist speculated that her symptoms were brain inflammation due to an overactive immune response from her 1st dose. As a result, she was able to get a subsequent dose under his direction while taking precautions and medication, and she was fine. But I was keenly aware of potential adverse reactions, so it made connecting the dots in the first cast a lot easier. In pylon's case, if he was more aware of potential risks, he may have sought care with his first instance of arrhythmia.

I get that they basically just wanted to get people vaccinated, and antivaxxers made a reasonable conversation about vaccine risks essentially impossible. But it's a lot better that people know any risks of serious side effects (however small) up front rather than discovering them after experiencing them. European countries seemed to have much more nuance in that regard, and it didn't seem to hurt vaccination rates.

[Nyah]

Popping this in here Pylon, because I had weird stuff happen with my heart too. I was responding to TherapyforGlencross (which is a hilarious username, BTW) who also was having strange cardiovascular symptoms post vaccine. It definitely seems more common than people realize.

Originally Posted by Nyah

Just speaking from my experience, but I had something similar a year ago when I got my first (and last) booster. A week later, my heart started to seemingly skip a beat, then just take off for no reason. I've since been diagnosed with a heart arrhythmia. It could've been triggered by the vaccine or it could just be a coincidence that it decided to show up when it did, my doctor can't say for sure. It did stop after a week or so, although it'll pop up randomly every once and a while now.

[pylon]

Originally Posted by Nyah

Popping this in here Pylon, because I had weird stuff happen with my heart too. I was responding to TherapyforGlencross (which is a hilarious username, BTW) who also was having strange cardiovascular symptoms post vaccine. It definitely seems more common than people realize.

What you described above is damn near exactly what I went through, but I got tagged with A-fib. I also bought one of those little Kardia Bluetooth thingies, and that's what it was saying. "Possible A-Fib".

I do want to clarify though. I am certainly not an anti-vaxxer. I believe in protecting society as a whole, even if that means you a few people are gonna get the short end of the stick.

It just really sucks when you get the short end of the stick, and you bring it to the professionals attention, and now they think you are some Freedumb Convoyer for complaining.

Just as irrational as the Antivax crowd is, the wide eyed Vaccine zealots can be equally irrational and dismissive of anyone questioning any part of it. There simply hasn't been enough time and data to simply dismiss anyone claiming to have side effects.

[GGG]

Regardless. At the beginning of the whole pandemic and when vaccines became available, I was one of the jerks berating and judging people for not getting vaccinated or wearing masks. Telling people to "Trust the science" and being quite an a-hole to anyone questioning getting it. Even lost a few friends over how militant my stance was. I've had to eat a lot of crow.

I know you said you “had to eat crow” but I would disagree. You made the best risk based decision based on the information you had at the time. Even if you had conclusive proof that the afib issue was caused by the vaccine you still would have made the correct choice to get the vaccines you did because you reduced your risk of dying from Covid more than you increased your risk of heart issues.

That you had negative outcomes doesn’t mean your decision was wrong.

[Nyah]

I don't think he's talking about his own decision to get the vaccine, just that he was a militant pro-vaxxer who judged people who didn't get vaccinated. I was too...but my potential negative outcome has really changed that. I have a good idea now why a lot of people didn't want to take a chance with a negative outcome, and I no longer judge them at all for that. I'm not talking about the people who were loud & proud, marching down 17th every Sunday. Just the ones who quietly decided that it wasn't for them. I'm also not an anti-vaxxer, and put in the same situation again with the information I had, I'd still have gotten the shot, although I'd probably skip the booster now. And I won't be getting any more.

I also really question now the ethics surrounding vaccine mandates, especially for things like whether or not you keep you job when the vaccine itself is obviously not without risks for a lot of people.

[Puxlut]

I posted a few months ago with the issues I have had since my third shot and was essentially told by another poster to STFU.
I believe it triggered an autoimmune disease, which triggered menopause. Cardiac-wise: I also developed PVCs. I'm on month 3 of my short-term disability because of the symptoms I have been having since Fall 2021. And I have a brain scan scheduled for tomorrow morning. I went from being a healthy, athletic, positive person to having no quality of life, a laundry list of symptoms that no doctor wants to touch (not my specialty, or I'm not educated enough to help you) that can barely get through the day.
There are many friends that developed issues as well Come to think of it, I think I know more people that developed complications from the vaccine than I know that died from the virus?

[pylon]

Originally Posted by GGG

I know you said you “had to eat crow” but I would disagree. You made the best risk based decision based on the information you had at the time. Even if you had conclusive proof that the afib issue was caused by the vaccine you still would have made the correct choice to get the vaccines you did because you reduced your risk of dying from Covid more than you increased your risk of heart issues.

That you had negative outcomes doesn’t mean your decision was wrong.

That's where I'm gonna disagree.

The only reason I got the shots was to protect those around me. I personally was more than willing to roll the dice on getting the virus. Through the whole thing I saw my parents in person 4 times, and would have been perfectly OK to make those visits FaceTime. Like Puxlut, I am healthy, active and have no comorbidities. I also have made it through all 30 years of my adult life avoiding vaccines, antibiotics and any medications to keep my immune system strong for when I truly those medications and vaccines in old age. Like most unvaxxed people I know, would have just endured a week or two of a really crappy flu.

It is going to be very interesting over the next decade, what we end up finding out on a bunch of issues. Origin of the virus, long term vaccine side effects, and of it was truly worth jabbing every living walking breathing person with impunity.

I agree that it was well worth vaccinating seniors and highly at risk people with comorbidities. But I have a feeling the consensus is going to be, we shouldn't have been vaccinating young, healthy strong people. Yes we should have encouraged them to use PPE, masks and socially distance. But we shouldn't have been so militant and berating of those young healthy strong people that wished to avoid the vaccine due to its experimental status and unknown side effects.

But all those waivers we all signed..... are gonna basically make all that pointless should it be proven the vaccine was in fact more harmful than we knew.

[opendoor]

Originally Posted by pylon

I also have made it through all 30 years of my adult life avoiding vaccines, antibiotics and any medications to keep my immune system strong for when I truly those medications and vaccines in old age.

I hope that thinking isn't driving your medical decisions, because it displays a real ignorance of how the immune system works. You're far more likely to end up with complications (potentially severe ones) if you avoid standard treatment regimens in a futile attempt to "keep your immune system strong".

[Fuzz]

There is no certainty that getting covid wouldn't have given you Afib:

There are no specific reports on the occurrence of AF during COVID-19 infection. Based on available literature, among COVID-19 patients, AF was detected in 19% to 21% of all cases.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7462635/

Those are much much higher odds than the potential vaccine induced Afib I linked earlier. And the vaccine may have prevented you getting covid, combined with Afib. So I don't really think avoiding the vaccine would have led to better outcomes for you.

[Dion]

Originally Posted by Puxlut

I posted a few months ago with the issues I have had since my third shot and was essentially told by another poster to STFU.
I believe it triggered an autoimmune disease, which triggered menopause. Cardiac-wise: I also developed PVCs. I'm on month 3 of my short-term disability because of the symptoms I have been having since Fall 2021. And I have a brain scan scheduled for tomorrow morning. I went from being a healthy, athletic, positive person to having no quality of life, a laundry list of symptoms that no doctor wants to touch (not my specialty, or I'm not educated enough to help you) that can barely get through the day.
There are many friends that developed issues as well Come to think of it, I think I know more people that developed complications from the vaccine than I know that died from the virus?

I hope there is a good outcome for you, Puxlut.

Some of my friends have had bad side effects from the vaccine which has made me question the safety of the shots.

[Locke]

Originally Posted by Nyah

I don't think he's talking about his own decision to get the vaccine, just that he was a militant pro-vaxxer who judged people who didn't get vaccinated. I was too...but my potential negative outcome has really changed that. I have a good idea now why a lot of people didn't want to take a chance with a negative outcome, and I no longer judge them at all for that. I'm not talking about the people who were loud & proud, marching down 17th every Sunday. Just the ones who quietly decided that it wasn't for them. I'm also not an anti-vaxxer, and put in the same situation again with the information I had, I'd still have gotten the shot, although I'd probably skip the booster now. And I won't be getting any more.

I also really question now the ethics surrounding vaccine mandates, especially for things like whether or not you keep you job when the vaccine itself is obviously not without risks for a lot of people.

Yeah, this is something that I deal with too.

I dont do well with vaccines. I am that guy that gets relatively mild side-effects from vaccines. It happens all the time.

As someone who runs their own business, I cannot be sick at certain times of the year so I get my Flu shot every single year. But I get it later than most people at a time of the year where if I'm down for a few days it isnt the end of the world.

The 1st COVID vaccine? That was a treat! No side effects, aside from the sore arm (which I can easily deal with) it was a breeze.

2nd wasnt so nice but manageable and the 3rd and 4th put me on my ass for a few days.

Same as last week, I got my Flu shot and, true to form, I was feeling sick for about 5 days. A couple of them I could power through and a couple I had to stay home.

But I manage that by managing when I schedule them for.

Those are mild though. Just usual 'sick' stuff. Sore throat, runny nose, headaches and chills, you can deal with that. Not like what you and pylon went through.

But it definitely was in my mind when I'm looking at the COVID vaccines.

You cant reasonably deal with these Pro-Vaccine Zealots though.

"WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU HAVENT GOTTEN IT YET?!?!? GET IT!! GET IT NOWWWW!!!!!"

Naw man...I have to make sure that it aligns with my schedule. I cant get it immediately because if it puts me on my ass for a few days I need to be able to reasonably accommodate that.

I'm the farthest thing from an Anti-Vaxxer. I've gotten every vaccine I should get, just in my own time. I'm not one of those people who can just get every vaccine all the time whenever, it has to coincide properly with my work/life schedule.

In some people's minds if you're not first in line for the next available booster you might as well grab a Nazi flag and drive to Ottawa.

I told someone that I get my Flu shot in Jan/Feb because I have to be healthy for Feb/March/April/May and their reaction was to essentially berate me for it.

I'm too busy with Year-Ends in Oct/Nov and theres too much happening in December, I cant be down for a week during these time periods.

Hey, if you're one of those people who can get any vaccine wherever, whenever and skate on by without any issues then good on ya! But it shouldnt be too much to realize that not everyone is like that.

[Nyah]

Originally Posted by Fuzz

There is no certainty that getting covid wouldn't have given you Afib

That article is from 2020. It'll be interesting to see the data now that Covid has mutated so much and the vaccine is widely used.

[Fuzz]

Originally Posted by Nyah

That article is from 2020. It'll be interesting to see the data now that Covid has mutated so much and the vaccine is widely used.

If you search for it there are several newer studies showing similar things. I guess it shouldn't be a surprise, since it is known covid causes other heart related disorders(at much greater occurrence than vaccine induced ones).

[Nyah]

Originally Posted by Fuzz

I guess it shouldn't be a surprise, since it is known covid causes other heart related disorders(at much greater occurrence than vaccine induced ones).

This isn't really being recorded or diagnosed, though. When I asked my doctor about my heart issues directly post vaccine, she say maybe, maybe not. It wasn't documented or submitted as a statistic, even as a plausibility. Same with Pylon. We don't have any way of knowing how many people are seeing effects like this from the vaccine at this point because (at lease here) it's not recorded data.

I realize that anecdotal evidence is in no way a sure study, but I know exactly zero people who have experienced cardiac related effects after getting Covid, and almost everyone I know has had it at least once. Thanks to this forum, I now know of three people who have had cardiac issues (myself included) directly after a vaccine. Until they start really collecting data, the bolded above is really just speculation.