Tim Kaine was once hopeful that his colleagues would take the looming threat of long Covid more seriously if they knew someone living with the mysterious post-viral illness — himself.

Earlier this year, the Virginia senator and former vice presidential candidate started bringing up the nerve sensitivity that he fears may be permanent at every health care-related hearing, in backroom conversations with colleagues, in speeches and during press conferences.

After he was infected in March of 2020 — with strange symptoms he first thought were an allergic reaction — Kaine watched his wife, other loved ones, and fellow senators make full recoveries while his own discomfort remained. Weeks turned into months, then into years.

Now, he stresses to fellow lawmakers and top Biden officials that he’s spent two years feeling “as if every nerve ending in my body has had five cups of coffee.”

“I can feel every nerve ending right now as I’m talking to you,” he told POLITICO. “It’s just kind of a tingling in my veins all the time.”

Sitting behind an expansive wooden desk strewn with papers in his Capitol Hill office earlier this year, the walls behind him covered in framed photos, signed bills and Virginia memorabilia up to the high ceiling, Kaine said he was at first hesitant to speak about his condition because his symptoms are relatively mild compared to those of many people around the country who are debilitated physically, mentally or both by Covid-19.