My first vaccine was AstraZeneca, administered at a local Rexall. At the time, I was told to wait patiently and Rexall would contact me for my second vaccine.
However, the rules changed in the interim, so, when I was 8 weeks after my first dose, the current protocol was to find your own second dose.
I put myself on all the pharmacy waiting lists in my area, and tried the Ontario vaccine booking system (which is how you book Toronto Public Health clinics) several times a day. Unfortunately, the vaccine booking tool initially wasn't able to meet demand - I kept getting the walking man or error messages or no appointments available, and on the rare occasions when there was an appointment somewhere I could plausibly get to, the appointment would disappear by the time I clicked through.
Finally, after a week of vaccine-hunting (i.e. 9 weeks after my first shot), I was able to secure an appointment at the Toronto Public Health clinic in my neighbourhood (North Toronto Memorial Community Centre) for 11 weeks after my first shot.
There was a pop-up clinic for which I was eligible 2 days before my scheduled appointment (I didn't go because I'd rather attend a scheduled appointment just a couple of blocks from home than go all the way out to Dufferin to wait in line in the rain), but none of the pharmacies came through with an appointment before then.
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I arrived at NTMCC at the appointment time, and was greeted by firefighters (I don't know why either) who offered me hand sanitizer, asked if I had an appointment (although didn't verify it), and instructed me to get out my health card.
Then I walked into the building, and passed through a series of people who scanned my card and/or asked me screening questions. There was a long line (indoors, masked, social distancing stickers on the floor), but it was moving steadily.
They were offering Moderna to age 18+ and Pfizer to age 12-17. They made
very clear at every point that I'd be getting Moderna that day.
I passed through about six different checkpoints each doing different screening before I arrived at the table where I was injected with the actual vaccine. The needle went into my arm about 15 minute after my scheduled appointment time.
The nurse who issued a vaccination gave me a card indicating the time I was allowed to leave, then I was then sent to a recovery area to wait out my 15 minutes. It was a separate room with physically-distanced chairs for patients to sit in. There was an optional questionnaire about social determinants of health to fill out while we waited.
There was a large clock on the front wall of the room, and when the time indicated on the card the vaccinating nurse gives you has been reached, you can go to the desk at the front and check out. The vaccine receipt is issued when you check out (meaning if you sneak out early, you won't get proof of vaccination). I think they might also validate parking or something - they asked me if I'd parked in the underground garage, but since I'd walked I don't actually know where that line of inquiry was going.
I left the clinic 32 minutes after my appointment time, and 17 minutes after the needle went into my arm.
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Various logistics:
- I had a specific scheduled appointment time, but I don't believe they ever confirmed my identity against the scheduled appointments. I was asked if I had an appointment, but I didn't perceive anything to be checking me against a list of names and appointment times. They did swipe my health card several times so it might have happened stealthily there.
- All the screening questions, and the injection itself, took place in open areas where you were visible to others and it was possible to be overheard by others. There was a sign saying that modesty areas are available upon request, but I didn't request one so I have no insight into how they worked.
- The proof of vaccination I received was printed on receipt paper, and doesn't seem very durable.
- Every single person I interacted with or witnessed was actively warm and welcoming and helpful, even though they were literally repeating the exact same interaction with hundreds of people over and over throughout the day. The nurse who gave me my injection was very patient with my enthusiastic chattering about the Euro cup final. (It was my neighbourhood's first collective sports experience since the Raptors won in 2019 and I got caught up in the emotion!) The staff in the recovery room were also very patient with the white lady ranting about how the (optional) questionnaire (where you could check as many boxes as you want and fill out an "other" blank at the end of every question) thought she was white when she Wasn't Really because There Are Different Parts of Europe. (Spoiler alert: she was even whiter than me and her ancestors have not spoken anything but English in living memory.)
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After-effects and recovery:
About 3 hours after the vaccine, the injection site started hurting, way more than I expected.
I tossed and turned all night, maybe scraping together a total of 6 hours of sleep in 12 hours spent in bed. When I finally got out of bed (16 hours after the vaccine), my arm hurt so much I couldn't lift my arm enough to wash my hair. My temperature was 1 degree above my normal (37.2 on a thermometer that normally gives me a reading of 36.2).
I took a standard Tylenol (my doctor advised me to take Tylenol rather than my usual ibuprofen for vaccine symptoms, but also emphasized that this advice is not appropriate for all patients) and about half an hour later was able to lift my arm enough to shower. My lymph nodes became inflamed shortly afterwards, and I spent the whole day after my vaccine feeling a general malaise. It reminded me of when you have a nasty cold but take Dayquil or something - no specific symptoms, but a general feeling of under the weather.
I slept 12 straight hours the second night after the vaccine, and woke up on Day 3 with my armpit lymph nodes so inflamed that I could see them when I looked in the mirror. There was still some mild but appreciable pain in the injection site, but I had a full range of motion and full use of my arm.
I continued to be moodier than made sense under the circumstances for the next week or so, and my lymph nodes gradually shrank back to their normal size during that time.
My period started right on schedule, 2 days after the vaccine, and was well within the range of normal.
The Rexall that administered my first vaccine contacted me 3 days after I received my second vaccine to book an appointment. I cancelled all the other waitlists as soon as I received the shot, so I don't know how well they did or did not work.
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Overall, I preferred the experience of getting vaccinated in a pharmacy. I felt like I had more time and space to ask questions, and more thoughtful and personalized attention. (I likely could have asked questions at the mass vaccination clinic and I would have done so if my questions had been actionable, but I felt like I'd be delaying the whole process if I took the time to ask whether the vaccine would attack the spike proteins of other coronaviruses.) However, I do recognize that pharmacies would not be an efficient enough way to get the kind of vaccine rollout we need, so mass vaccination clinics are a key component of the vaccine strategy.
I found the side-effects of the Moderna less bothersome than the AstraZeneca. Even though the pain of the Moderna injection site temporarily limited my mobility, I found the alternating fever and chills that came with AstraZeneca more disruptive, and the heavy bloating that came in my subsequent PMS week more uncomfortable.
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