Tim Husereau, a Voice in the Wilderness for an Illness That Seems Invisible

Tim Husereau Influencer Extraordinaire

By Pauline Masson – 

I’ve been watching Tim Husereau’s videos on his Covid 19 Challenge and I’ve had an epiphany of sorts.

What struck me about Tim’s videos is how healthy he looks. He looks strong, vibrant and macho. Even when he describes tough times with long Covid, he looks wonderful.

And eventually that is what struck home with me.

One of the reasons the health care community has not come up with serioous help for Long Covid suferrers, I have come to believe, is because they can’t see it. Nobody can see it. Not the doctors, the clinicians, the physical therapists or the researchers. They can’t see anything they can fix. They offer similar advice: Pace yourself, use your limited energy carefully. Don’t exert yourself. Well  .  .  .  .

For three years and three months, since July 1922 after a severe bout of flu, I have been challenged with a muscle disabling malaise that I describe as fatigue, or weariness,

I once had a physical therapist who marveled at my muscle strength after a series of pushes and lifts. “I’m so tired,” I said. “”Just one more,” he said. “You are strong. You can do this.”  And so I did as he asked. I made it home, made it to my bed and for three days could not even raise my arm with a spoonful of soup to feed myself.

But looking at me, or even talking on the phone, like the well-meaning physical therapist, people can’t see anything wrong with me.

When I run into an acquaintance in a store aisle, they envariably say, “You look great.”

On the telephone, every day, a friend or acquaintance says, “You sound strong.”

One frequent comment that acquaintances may not realize comes across as gentle criticism – is “You don’t look sick.”

So here comes big beautiful Tim, videoing himself, not looking sick, discussing the symptoms of Long Covid and urging people who have it to maintain hope.

“If you’re feeling low you are not alone, don’t give up, don’t give in,” he says as he  urges friends and acquaintances to join his Covid 19 Challenge by doing one physical thing every day 19 times. And by contributing to a fund to research and find a cure, or at least effective treatment, for this invisible crippler.

I’ve avoided describing my fatigue, except to my Buddy Dan McClain, who also had Long Covid, twice I think, because I didn’t want to sound like was seeking sympathy.

But Tim has no self-serving reserve. He unabashedly explains in revelatory detail the kind of symptoms that have been his life for (not sure how mnany) years.

In full face closeup he describes, with absolute no hesitation, the effects that Long Covid has had on him. And through it all, he had been blessed (my word, not his) with the determination to persevere.

And now, he is challenging us, the community, to join him in finding help for the thousands of people who have been struck with Long Covid since 2020.

Through campaigns like Tim’s, treatment, sometimes cures, have been found for a series of debilitating diseases like cancer and polio.

One things that helped these eresearch efforts, I believe, is that health professionals can see cancer, polio, heart conditions, diabetes and other debiliting and crippling diseases on X-rays, scans, echo grams and blood tests.

I’ve had them all, some more than once, and no one can see anything wrong with me.

“I don’t know why they sent you here,” one heart doctor said. And he actually gave a little chuckle as if the joke was on someone.

But to me, and to Tim, this is no laughing matter. It is life in the post Covid era.

So I urge everyone who has a few free minutes  to log on to Tim’s Facebook page, watch his videos, and if you can, contribute to hs research project for this invisible disease.

Author: paulinemasson

Pauline Masson, editor/publisher. View all posts by paulinemasson