He knew he would catch it eventually.
Due to the nature of his job, a New Whiteland detective said contracting COVID-19 was inevitable.
It was three weeks before Christmas when Detective Craig Whited of the New Whiteland Police Department started experiencing symptoms. He had body aches in his legs and extreme exhaustion.
He hadn’t had a fever yet, nor did he lose his sense of smell or taste, but to his surprise, he tested positive for COVID-19 Dec. 12.
“I was really getting concerned thinking, ‘Well, what’s wrong with me?’” Whited said. “This is going to sound silly, but it was actually a little bit of a relief when they told me I was positive because I had an answer.”
So, his 10-day quarantine began. Whited was isolated to his bedroom and home office in his house. His wife slept on the couch, and she and his son had little contact with him for nearly two weeks.
After testing positive, his first thought was the safety of his family. Thankfully, he said, both his wife and son tested negative and never showed any symptoms.
“It was me kind of holding my breath for the next several days to see if they started getting symptoms,” Whited said.
Although Whited said he believed he had what was considered some of the minor, less life-threatening symptoms of COVID-19, those symptoms were severe, and recovery was not easy nor quick. It took three weeks for him to get back on his feet again.
He didn’t experience a lot of congestion or respiratory problems, which was a relief, he said. He never lost his sense of smell or taste, but had a fever and chills off and on for a few days. He had continuous “crazy” body aches, mostly in his legs.
The worst part was the exhaustion. He slept about 20 hours a day the first week after he tested positive, only waking up to eat if he had the energy.
“This was like nothing I’ve experienced before,” Whited said. “It was the kind of exhaustion that was like after you ate, you’d be up for about 20 minutes and think, ‘Man, I’ve got to lie back down or else I’m going to be on the floor.”
By the second week, he slept about 12 hours a day, only going back to bed in the morning between breakfast and lunch. Some days were better than others in terms of how he felt, he said.
“There were a couple days there when you think, ‘Well, I’m feeling a bit better,’ but then the next day you’re like, ‘Nope,’” Whited said.
The third week after testing positive he could stay up all day, but he still had very low energy.
“There were definitely days in that third week when I would’ve liked to go back to bed, but I knew I had to push through this,” Whited said.
A month later, Whited is back to 100%, and he’s at work again. Like many public safety workers, part of his job requires possibly exposing himself to COVID-19 regularly.
He took as many precautions as possible at work. He wore a mask, used hand sanitizer and limited contact with people. He added that a lot of the people he does come in contact with on runs are usually in a state of mind where they do not care about their own or other people’s health, so they may not be as cautious about preventing the spread of COVID-19 in that moment.
“All it takes is one slip-up,” Whited said. “I figured I would get it at some point … working in public safety and being dispatched into different people’s homes, and the amount of people you come into exposure with.”
