| Most people have experienced that moment when those dreaded two red lines appear on their lateral flow test. But for me, testing positive for Covid is even more disheartening. As I've written about previously, I've tried to avoid getting sick since developing long Covid more than two years ago, because being reinfected has the potential to undo any recovery I've made. So when I tested positive again recently, I braced myself for some difficult weeks ahead. During the first few days, I couldn't tolerate daylight or artificial light, which meant spending a lot of time lying down in the dark. My brain had thoughts, but I wasn't able to form them into words. My ribs hurt from all the coughing, while food tasted metallic. I often think about the infection in 2022 that developed into long Covid, wondering whether there was anything I should have done differently. Did I not take enough time to recover? Did I try to do too much, too soon? So this time around, I was more mindful of the recuperation process. I slept a lot, took over-the-counter medicine and vitamins, ate three balanced meals a day and drank plenty of water. A week later, I was no longer testing positive, but I still had light sensitivity issues, prompting concerns that it might turn into a longer-term issue: some people suffering from long Covid have been confined to a dark room. Neil Lagali, a professor in experimental ophthalmology at Linköping University in Sweden, has been conducting research with his colleagues on eye problems following mild Covid infections. The most common symptom they found in a study of a hundred people in Sweden was light sensitivity, also known as photophobia. One possible explanation is related to nerves in the brain that regulate the amount of light entering the eye. Because of the slower pupil response, people are getting too much light and "it's kind of overwhelming the brain," he says. About a third of the people Lagali and his colleagues examined were on sick leave because their eye problems prevented them from doing their jobs, he says. Getting reinfected with Covid can also make eye issues worse. While the symptoms can alleviate over a longer period of time, recovery "seems to be very slow," Lagali says. Taking eye drops, wearing color-tinted glasses and taking part in eye-training programs can help. For my part, I bought blackout curtains, lowered the screen brightness on my devices and saw an optician to get my eyes tested. The results confirmed my eyes were healthy, even though my head still hurt from the light. I started another round of nicotine patches and spoke to my doctors — one thought the light sensitivity issues sounded similar to migraines. Although my light intolerance subsided in the weeks after the reinfection, it hasn't gone away completely and sensory overload continues to be an issue. I now switch my phone to dark mode between sunset and sunrise to ease the strain on my eyes. It's still too early to know for sure what longer-term impact the reinfection might have, but I'm trying to not over-exert myself while also avoiding situations where I might get sick again. In the meantime, I'm just glad that — for most of the time — I can be back in a room with the lights on. — Lisa Pham | 
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