How I Cheated Death and COVID-19

“I should be on the front line. I should be with my fellow nurses saving lives. But, instead, I’m home recovering from weeks of pure hell. I got knocked off my feet by COVID-19. And just like that, I became a wounded soldier on the battlefield.”

As I sit home watching the news featuring fellow nurses in dire strait, I think about my trajectory in this field. I remember losing my first patient as a new nurse working in a nursing home. With tears in my eyes, I said to my supervisor, “I’m not coming back here.” My supervisor, an OG in the game, affectionately laughed and replied, “Ms. Jean- Baptiste, you’ll be all right.”

She was right. I went back the next day and the day after that and no one died on my watch. Eventually, the tears dried up and my anxiety of losing another patient was replaced with experience and wisdom. But something feels different now. With death so imminent and knocking on my door, my supervisor’s advice from almost 20 years ago seems antiquated.

Honestly, will I be all right? Also, will the front-line nurses who are losing 10 and 20 patients in one shot, will they too be all right?

I’ve started and deleted this post several times because saying out loud, “I have COVID-19” sounds pretty daunting and terminal. It doesn’t make for a great conversation piece. I even questioned the relevance of sharing this with my professional network.

“Who cares?” echoed through my head as I wrestled with an aggressive cough and shortness of breath. Despite my trepidation, I come to you all as a SURVIVOR.

It’s been a long journey. And not only did COVID-19 take a physical toll on my body, but it also caused me to mentally check-out for weeks. I couldn’t write a single professional email, a pitch, anything. Emails from my writing clients saying, “I’m going to need you soon,” and “Hey, can you take a look at my resume?” did nothing to take me out of my trance.

My symptoms started with severe back pain. I thought I slept wrong and decided to pop a few extra-strength Tylenol tabs. When that didn’t work, I had my niece place an analgesic patch on my lower back to no avail. The next day, the back pain intensified, accompanied by generalized muscle aches, chills, and extreme fatigue. Thinking I must be experiencing allergies since it’s that time of the year, I took a Xyzal tab, a popular allergy medication.

That night I went to sleep feeling like as if a Mack truck hit me. I was very fatigued and feverish. I went on like this for at least two days, still in denial that I had you know what.

When my symptoms became unbearable, I reached out to my provider. He screened me over the phone and told me to self-quarantine for 14 days. All attempts to see him at the hospital to get tested for COVID-19 were met with resistance. Not even the argument that I’m a first responder did anything to sway his decision. According to my local hospital’s guidelines, I was not a candidate for the test because I didn’t have a cough nor shortness of breath at the time.

Two days later after my initial phone screening, I called the hospital again. The back pain had become debilitating, along with the presence of extreme fatigue. My doctor wasn’t in, so his colleague told me to come in. Although I had a fever, the absence of shortness of breath and cough still didn’t qualify me to get the test. The covering doctor tested my urine to make sure I didn’t have a kidney infection since I had back pain and gave me a flu test (it’s the same process of COVID-19 testing where providers swab the inside of both nostrils).

Both my urine and flu test came back negative. I was told that if my flu test is negative, then consider myself positive for COVID-19. I knew my symptoms were consistent with the virus, so there was no doubt in my mind that I had it. However, when I developed shortness of breath and cough while my other symptoms were disappearing, I knew it was time to know for sure if I had it. I didn’t want these symptoms to land me in the hospital on a ventilator.

I bypassed trying to get tested in Brooklyn since it’s one of the hardest-hit boroughs in NYC. I went to an urgent care center on Long Island and got tested with ease. Please note I was tested because of the presence of a cough and shortness of breath. I didn’t have a fever, a tell-tell sign of having an infection.

The next day, the urgent care doctor called me with my positive test result. It’s like a weight had been lifted off my shoulders. I was prescribed a cough suppressant, a rescue inhaler, and instructed to take over the counter Mucinex DM to loosen up my secretions.

Family and friends who knew my situation sent me all types of recipes for remedies. As an avid coffee lover, I started to rely heavily on consuming tea with ginger and lemon. My mother made me some remedy from her homeland of Haiti. She gave me a fair warning that it wasn’t too delectable—she was right. I obliged by taking a few sips and now her concoction made of garlic, aloe, ginger, and love, is stationed in my fridge behind my salad dressing. Needless to say, I stuck to my prescription meds. 😊

I’m currently recovering and following doctor’s orders. I even started working with my writing clients again, something that didn’t seem likely about a week ago. Mentally, I don’t believe any of us will come out this the same. It’s been such a traumatic experience.

So many lives have been impacted, jobs, and lives that have been lost. During the height of my fight with COVID-19, I kept thinking in the back of my head what if my situation takes a turn for the worst since I have a preexisting condition that makes fighting this virus even tougher. I was relentless in my fight to get tested. I’ve heard too many stories of people succumbing to this virus, due to not being tested nor properly diagnosed.

If there’s anything I learned throughout this experience, is that you have to advocate for yourself. We’re living in a time of confusion, loneliness, and great anxiety. I believe in social distancing, stay-at-home orders, but I’m 100% for being a champion over your health.