Here's what to expect (I've had both of my Pfizer vaccines, luckily I didn't get it from my wife and daughter who got COVID about 10 days after my first vaccine). At the 13 day mark, I had trace antibodies by a Healgen rapid antibody test. By 21 days, it was markedly positive. Despite ten Abbot BinaxNOW rapid antigen tests, I was never positive for COVID despite my wife and daughter having it. Proof that the vaccine works unless there is a very random chance that all my rapid antigen tests were falsely negative.
#1: I felt immediately dizzy/woozy and felt that way for a few hours. My arm was sore at about the 6 hour mark and continued for 24 hours. About the same as a flu shot.
#2: Felt great first 8 hours or so then arm soreness started setting in. At the 12 hour mark, my arm was so sore I had trouble moving it. I actually joked that I may have to have anesthesia intubate any of my patients the following day because my arm was so sore. At the 18 hour mark, I awakened with severe rigors (didn't actually mount a temp), severe nausea, and body aches. I could barely sleep that night. Had to be at work at 6 am that day and felt like crap the entire day. I felt like the flu on massive steroids -- definitely the worst I've ever felt before. Not even falciparum malaria when I was in Zambia felt this bad. Unfortunately, I couldn't find coverage and had to show up to work. I had the worst fatigue I've ever felt in my life, nausea that wasn't helped with Zofran, and bad body aches. I took Tylenol and Motrin at work for body aches and must have had a slight fever because I became pretty sweaty afterwards. I came home, went to bed at 4:30 pm, awakened at 9 pm and got some chicken noodle soup from Chick-fil-A, and then went back to bed. I awakened at 4:30 am for my Sunday shift (also couldn't find coverage) and felt absolutely perfectly fine when I awakened.
For the vast majority of people, they have not experienced such bad side effects. Around 25-30% experience flu-like symptoms. The rest only have a sore arm. Maybe half the people who have flu-like symptoms develop moderate to severe symptoms. One of our nurses had a temp of 105.
There are reports out of Norway about nursing home patients dying after receiving the vaccine. It's cause for concern for those >80 years of age to consider. 23 deaths seems a lot to be coincidence.
https://www.bmj.com/content/372/bmj.n149
For the vast majority of people, the COVID vaccine's side effects are minimal and still recommended people get it. I would much prefer to have 24 hours of COVID-like symptoms than have COVID itself with my OSA, hypertension, diabetes, etc. I've spent way more time than I would like watching people of all ages struggle to breathe, some of whom never make it alive out of the hospital despite very heroic efforts (including ECMO). Even if COVID doesn't kill you, the morbidity associated with it is something you cannot describe unless you experience it first hand. Unfortunately, I see it every single shift I work in the ER (5-10 patients/day with COVID). We currently have >220 people hospitalized with COVID, which represents almost 30% of all admissions in the hospital where I work.
Get your vaccines people. If they're offered to you, you should take one. COVID isn't going away until we get 70-80% herd immunity whether from infection or from vaccination.