Sick with the flu and forced to work…

It sucks because I’ve had the flu for two and a half weeks now. And I happen to work with patients but I’ve called in twice in the past week and left early one of the days because I was coughing so badly. I still have the cough but it’s not causing me as much pain and my body doesn’t ache like it did.

So I decide to show up to work but I hate it because patients make remarks regarding me being sick. They always say “oh hopefully you don’t give it to me” and then I had lowered my mask in a patients room because wearing it fully sometimes makes it hard to breathe and I wasn’t facing the patient directly at that time. But his wife was like can you please wear your mask? Idk Ik she was being reasonable and just worried about her husband but it made me feel insecure since I hadn’t been wearing my mask all the way.

Last time I wore my mask without breaks it felt like I was just breathing in my germs and that made my cough worse so I try to give my face a breather sometimes. But in patient rooms I can’t help but to cough and I do try to cover my mouth when I do that. That’s why I try to hide my cough but it’s hard and then they find out I’m sick and it becomes awkward. I might talk to my manager hopefully they’ll be lenient and give me more time off? It also sucks because I’m pregnant and this flu has been the worst cold I’ve ever had.