When Covid was first mentioned over two years ago, I never imagined the impact it would have on my family and me. Not only did we have close friends die, not only did our own family get it more than once, not only did I end up researching and teaming up with others to help those in the hospital, BUT now we are thinking our ten-year-old child may have Long Haul Covid.
I had learned early on about the importance of quick treatment and intervention with Covid-19. So when my husband and I got the Delta variant of Covid, we treated ourselves aggressively using Ivermectin and the supplement protocol of vitamins that has become very familiar to us all by now. My children also were sick but recovered nicely. That approach worked nicely and by the grace of God, we were able to avoid going to the hospital. When we heard of Omicron, and it being milder, I assumed we were out of the woods. But, the Lord had other plans.
The Start of it All.
In early January My mother and sister contracted Omicron. I had a nagging cough but never tested for Covid at that time. My son never showed signs of sickness, and we did not think much more about it. But, about two weeks after that, he began to complain of his legs hurting. Within a few days, he had terrible stomach cramps and his legs hurt so bad he cried when he tried to walk. I was understandably very concerned. On Feb 13th, he started throwing up and had diarrhea. He had a tough time keeping anything down.
Then a few days later, he seemed better, but his legs continued to hurt, and the stomach cramps would come and go, followed by diarrhea. He also would complain of a headache. The mystery of all this would be that it literally would come in waves. It would come and go. He would be miserable and in tears. And then an hour later could run around and play. What was going on?
Is It Possible My Child May Have Long Haul Covid?
When these symptoms had been going on for weeks, I finally took my son to the doctor to run some tests. While he did say he had swollen glands, they ruled out Strep and any raging infection. They ran a full panel of bloodwork which all came back negative and with no sign of any issues. The Dr. thought these symptoms were from a mouth sore he was getting over (the herpes virus internally). We went with that diagnosis for a short time, but then it became clearer that something more was going on. When I messaged my doctor back to see if further tests should be run, he said he really thought this would go away on its own and he didn’t know what other tests he would run.
I was working with the wesavedourmom.com team and was getting advice from them through this whole time. They have been a blessing to many throughout these crazy times, and they are so knowledgeable! They have helped many people using orthomolecular medicine over the last few years, particularly assisting families to get their loved ones out of the hospital with Covid.
The WSOM team has researched and put together a protocol to help those who were “Long Haulers.” I read up on MIS-C in children, the longer this went on with my son, we became more and more convinced that my child may have Long Haul Covid.
Why Doesn’t The Bloodword Show Up If My Child May Have Long Haul Covid?
Thankfully, with my son’s case, it seems to be minor because his bloodwork would have been off if it was major and affecting his organs. But, if you think your child may have Long Haul Covid, it may not show in normal blood work if it’s mild.
According to Dr. Patterson, there are specific things in the blood that the doctors don’t usually test for when you are looking for long-covid. (Those reading this might check out his sight- The Covid Long-Haulers Treatment Center.)
According to this article, these are the markers in the blood we would be looking for if we tested my son:
1. Interleukin-2 is significantly elevated in Long-Covid. This is a type of cytokine signaling molecule that regulates the activity of white blood cells.
2. Interleukin-4 is significantly elevated in Long-Covid. This is a cytokine (produced by mast cells) that induces differentiation of naive helper T cells.
3. CCL3 is significantly elevated in Long-Covid. This is a chemokine involved in the acute inflammatory state. It also recruits and activates polymorphonuclear leukocytes.
4. Interleukin-6 is significantly elevated in Long-Covid. This type of cytokine (secreted by macrophages) stimulates the production of neutrophils in the bone marrow.
5. Interleukin-10 is significantly elevated in Long-Covid.
6. IFNγ is significantly elevated in Long-Covid.
This is a type of cytokine produced by NK and NKT cells as immune response.
7. VEGF is significantly elevated in Long-Covid. This protein stimulates the formation of blood vessels.
8. GM-CSF is significantly decreased in Long-Covid. Cytokine promotes neutrophil proliferation and maturation.
9. CCL4 is significantly decreased in Long-Covid.
In addition, there were 3 extra findings:
10. There was no evidence of T-cell exhaustion.
11. Long Haulers mild and severe cases all show elevated CCL5 (RANTES).
12. B-cells, CD14+ and CD16+ monocytic subset were significantly elevated.
A Few Choices To Make
We had to decide the best way forward for us with our ten-year-old boy.
- Contact the treatment center and run these special blood tests on my son to confirm we are dealing with long-haul covid.
- Wait and see if this is resolved on its own, but for how long?
- Treat my son like he has Long Covid and see how he does.
Since insurance doesn’t cover option #1 and the detox protocol will be good for my son regardless, we chose option #3. Even if we are wrong, all the supplements are safe and will not hurt him but are very beneficial for him.
As you can imagine, the emotional toll this all had on us was tremendous, but we also have seen God’s guidance through the whole situation. We still do not know for sure what the outcome of this will be, but I plan to let you in on the whole process. In the next post, I will share the protocol and more of the ups and downs of our journey.
Do you suspect your child may have Long Haul Covid? I am right there with you…prayerfully we will figure it out…together.
Read Part 2 Child’s Protocol for Long Covid and Part 3 I Helped My Child Recover From Long Covid
