I live near Chester, I’m 40, a single mum with three teenage children. My life before the vaccine was balanced. I looked after my three children at home, and I was able to study. I had an active life – I was studying full-time towards a BA degree in Criminology and Counselling and getting firsts in my assignments. I volunteered at a garden nursery planting dahlias and vegetables and maintaining the garden. I’d go on walks, to the gym, and I was sociable.
In 2019, I was diagnosed with HEDS (Hypermobile Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome with symptoms of neck pain, difficulty walking, numbness and tingling of the hands and feet, dizziness, swallowing difficulties, and changes in speech) but I was managing well and was able to live a full and active life, and even managed to look after my kids while studying full time. I was getting better and doing well with managing my HEDS symptoms.
I contracted covid at the end of November 2020. Because of the HEDS, it usually takes me a couple of months to fully recover from illness. I was post viral and I was beginning to have better days
Four days after my first vaccine, that all changed, and I experienced extreme tachycardia. These symptoms persevered and intensified, with the result that I had to take a two-year interruption from my studies because I couldn’t function at all.
I’m now back at Uni part-time. I feel like it’s been a horrid nightmare I can’t wake up from, like the world isn’t real anymore because they’re harming us intentionally.
I got the vaccine because I felt like I had to in order for us all to get back to normal. My doctors and some family members kept telling me I was vulnerable and needed it to protect myself against new variants. Also, I hated seeing my kids so miserable stuck in doors. I wanted to go abroad and to concerts. But then the covid measures kept changing and I realised what was happening with my health. I started trying to speak out and get help for my struggling health, but I was constantly made to feel like I was delusional, and that what I was experiencing was long covid or anxiety.
When I got my first vaccine, I was already post viral (recovering) at the time and I should never have had the vaccination administered. I was even convinced to get the second dose and take antihistamines. I got the second Astrazeneca on the 15th of June 2021 and then my period stopped. So, I said no to the third. I was terrified because I thought I was delusional about what was happening to my body. But all along I suspected it was the vaccine.
My first instinct was not to get the vaccine at all. But my family and doctors told me that my scepticism was based on misinformation and that all the vaccines were safe.
On 29 March 2021, four days after my first AstraZeneca, I had extreme tachycardia, but I didn’t make the link to the vaccine. The first time that medical intervention was involved was around 14 April 2021. I fainted and my family phoned for an ambulance. I came around and recovered alright. But the next day my speech was affected – I was slurring my words and what I was saying didn’t make sense.
I also felt fatigued soon after the jab, so much so that I couldn’t do anything. I would feel faint if I tried to walk the stairs and could only manage to stay in bed. If I tried to do anything else, I’d experience CFS (chronic fatigue syndrome). It was awful.
I took an interruption to my studies after these episodes as I couldn’t carry on – my symptoms gradually got worse and became debilitating. After the second AstraZeneca, my period stopped. Other symptoms I experience are:
• Light sensitivity
• Heart palpitations, diagnosed as POTS (postural tachycardia syndrome)
• Can’t eat dairy
• Dysautonomia
• Easily overstimulated followed by lots of pain at night and I need to rest
I struggled to get a diagnosis. I kept being told that it was “anxiety”. I went to my GP for an ECG because I had the worst heart palpitations, which I knew were not related to anxiety, and I now know is POTS. I also had seizures. I need to keep my heart rate below 160 beats per minute. If my heart rate went higher, I experienced neurological disturbances with my speech for a few days afterwards – I kept stuttering and losing words, and I was very confused.
I had severe abdominal pain – it felt like my insides were being ripped out and my heart rate went crazy when I stood. My mum took me to A&E and then I also had a huge panic attack. The attending doctor thought it may be cancer and sent me for an abdominal scan.
I also had a weird thing appear on my back, filled with blood, which was really painful.
I went to the hospital so many times with the symptoms, discomfort, and pain I was feeling that I lost count. At least 20 times. I was continuously having blood taken, being sent for X-rays and ECGs, wore a heart monitor twice, referred back to my surgery, and then just given medication and left to it. The last time I went I was referred to the long covid clinic. But I gave up with the system and decided to deal with my health myself. I’m now able to function with the symptoms rather than being bedridden.
Whenever I went to the hospital or for treatment, medical staff kept saying my symptoms were long covid even though I told them that my symptoms weren’t as bad before the vaccine. Eventually, after two years, my cardiologist noted the diagnosis of POTS on my report.
My pain levels were severe. On a scale of 10, probably around 20. I joke, but on days they were a 10. But fortunately, now they’re around 3-4. After my first AstraZeneca, I was prescribed strong propranolol which sent my mental health down the shooter and I became suicidal. So now I’m off all meds and it’s been a mad journey. It was painful coming off propranolol and meds but I had to feel the pain to work out what would help to alleviate it if that makes sense.
Luckily, I found a programme and was part of a test community that takes a broad approach to health. I basically had to figure out what was happening to me with guidance from the programme leader, going through a process of eliminating foods and listening to my body. I’m no longer on medication – I found it made me worse. Instead, I’ve gone all natural in my diet – organic seems to work best for me in achieving some kind of normal life. I basically follow a paleo diet and cold-water therapy, which is helping heaps to manage my symptoms.
I am also doing meditation, trauma counselling, movement and breath-work, light therapy, reflexology, acupuncture, and healing ceremonies to help me with the internal tremors.
My message to the world is to listen to your instinct always. Help vaccine injured with their voices, stop silencing medical professionals and don’t take anymore vaccines. These things need to be suspended and investigated NOW. Anyone else who feels afraid to speak up because you keep being silenced and you’re not sure – do so anyway: speak up! We are all here for one another.