Dianna Cowern, better known as Physics Girl, built a career explaining science to millions of people. But after a mild case of COVID, she developed debilitating symptoms that left her largely bedbound and unable to do many of the things she once took for granted, including sharing physics videos with her devoted fans.
" I was nonverbal. So sensitive to light and sound that I was spending every single day in a dark room with noise-canceling headphones on and dark glasses on so that I could take away every environmental stimulus because everything was too much for me," Dianna said. "I'd never experienced anything like it. I don't think most people have. And my life was so amazing leading up to this and was so incredible, and I was so grateful for everything that had been going on. And then just boom, like, everything got taken away."
After struggling to find answers, she was diagnosed with ME/CFS and mast cell activation syndrome. Three years after she stopped making videos, Dianna recently returned to Physics Girl with a new science video. We talk with Dianna and Kyle about the illness that changed their lives, the treatments that have helped her regain some abilities, the challenges of caring for someone with a poorly understood condition and what researchers are still trying to figure out.
Guests:
- Dianna Cowern aka Physics Girl, science communicator and physicist
- Kyle Kitzmiller, Long Covid and ME/CFS advocate and Physics Girl’s husband
Sources:
- The Surprising World of Local Twitch and YouTube Streamers (Julia Dixon Evans, Voice of San Diego, 2019)
- Community-Developed Resource Guide for Infection-Associated Chronic Conditions (IACC, 2025)
- ME/CFS Prevalence in the Long COVID Era: A Corrected U.S. Burden Estimate Using Infection-Associated Chronic Condition Modeling (Cynthia Adinig, CYNAERA Institute via SSRN, 2026)
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