I’m Getting Vaccinated

Hello, friends! Although this is a grad school blog, I’m making a bit of a different post today: it’s a post about getting the Covid-19 vaccine.

I work part time as a home care aide. I’m a doctoral student in clinical psychology, but everyone else who works at the company is a LVN or RN. That makes us “essential” to the pandemic, and therefore eligible to get vaccinated. People say that either option is a risk: you can take your chances with the illness, or with the vaccination. I fell into the former category, figuring that as an active, healthy 20-year-old, I could deal with Covid-19 better than most. Besides, my family and I stay very safe.

A recent podcast episode that I listened to changed my mind a little. The host was a healthy 24 year old who thought that Covid-19 would be a walk in the park. Little did she know that Covid-19 would deliver blow after blow for two whole weeks, during which she was mostly bedridden. After listening to this, my “I’m-young-and-invincible” attitude changed a little.

Suddenly, it was as if a lightbulb went off in my head: I wanted to get vaccinated. Getting a vaccination in America at this moment is nearly impossible, so writing about it feels almost self-congratulatory. What a weird time, when people are dying to get a shot that comes with side effects and a bandaid to boot. I’m scheduled to get my first shot of the Moderna vaccine on January 7th. I was surprised that there were open slots as soon as the next day.

I won’t lie, though. I feel guilty about being one of the first people to get vaccinated because I know many people who need it more than I do. People with poor health or compromised immune systems, older people, people with asthma, and the list goes on. And here I am, a girl who exercises 5x a week, at 20 years old, getting vaccinated. It makes me wish that the distribution in America was better than it is.

I read quite a bit about the clinical trials and decided for myself that I feel safe getting the vaccine. I’ll blog about my full experience on January 7th so that people who are more hesitant may be reassured.

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