5 minute read
Surviving COVID
Amy Carrillo tells the tale of the “fight of her life” battling COVID-19.
photos by Amber Yoshida
“There were times, multiple times, that I thought I was going to die,” Amy Carrillo says. “It was the scariest thing I’ve ever been through.”
Amy is a lot of things: wife, mom to 4, successful business coach, Adult Services Officer and most recently, a COVID-19 survivor. Carrillo battled the virus for more than two months, describing the experience as “horrifying.”
In mid-March, as the world was beginning to shut down in an effort to battle COVID-19, Amy didn’t feel well and spent the day in bed. The next day she heard that a co-worker’s husband had tested positive for the virus. At that point less than 100 peolple had died from the virus in the United States.
“Not much was known in Lawrence about the virus,” Carrillo explains. “This was right when schools and businesses had started to shut down and accurate, reliable information was pretty hard to find. When we learned that a co-worker’s husband had tested positive, all of us at the office were told to assume we also had the virus.”
Carrillo wasn’t worried about contracting the virus, or what effect it would have on her if she ever did test positive. She’s a healthy, active 42 year-old. She does yoga, runs and even did an Ironman triathlon when she was pregnant. It didn’t take long for that confidence to turn to fear.
“Starting right around spring break I was in bed for a month, and I’m not exaggerating,” Carrillo said. “I think it was a Saturday that I started to feel kind of fatigued and spent most of the day in bed. But, honestly, I didn’t think much of it. We’re a busy family so feeling tired can be pretty normal. That Monday I woke up feeling fine and that’s when the roller coaster really started.”
Carrillo says her entire experience with COVID-19 has been like a weird roller coaster. She would feel fine for a few hours and then the fatigue, muscle aches and shortness of breath would wipe her out. Nights, she says, were the worst.
“I woke up almost every night with sharp pains and pressure in my chest,” she explains. “I’d wake up in a panic with stabbing pains. Jason had to talk me down from panic attacks a few times.”
Jason, her husband, says watching his wife battle the virus was an emotional experience.
“I tried to be a steady, calm resource for Amy,” he says. “We knew that, for the most part, healthy younger people were not dying from the virus. Amy is a fighter and the most determined person I know, so I was confident she would be okay. The most frustrating part, other than having Amy feeling terrible, was the misinformation that was rampant.”
Amy admits she may have gone down a few internet rabbit holes while she was quarantined in their bedroom. “I had nothing else to do,” she says with a laugh. “I think I watched everything on Netflix. Social media was both a blessing and a curse then. Of course I am so thankful for all my friends that sent messages, but I would spend too much time reading stories and theories about the virus online. That took me to some dark places. I did join a couple COVID-19-Positive Facebook groups and it was helpful to hear from other people going through this experience.”
A week after Amy first started feeling down, she began to feel better (she had not actually been tested yet). She spent a day out of her bedroom, read a book and was hopeful she was on her way back. The next day she woke with her worst chest pains yet and was advised to get to the emergency room.
“I wasn’t admitted to the hospital. The staff was great but told me, essentially, that they couldn’t do anything for me. They administered a COVID-19 test and sent me home,” she says. “The next day I was told I tested positive for the virus.”
The next two weeks were a constant fluctuation of hope when she was feeling better and fear when she was short of breathe or felt the pressure in her chest.
“I couldn’t taste or smell anything,” Amy says. “Some days I couldn’t sleep much and was too tired to do anything productive. Others I felt like I was improving. It was frustrating and scary. I really started to wonder if I would ever feel normal again and I was worried about how this was affected my kids.”
Jason explains the kids were worried, but he and Amy worked to assure them that Mom would be fine, eventually.
“We were all home, obviously,” Jason says. “The kids got along well and started to help a bit more around the house, which was a nice change. Our youngest would snuggle with Amy in bed sometimes and I think that helped both of them feel a little better about the situation.”
After about a month, Amy began to have more good days than bad days. Her breathing became less shallow, her energy slowly returned and the headaches became less frequent. Now, she says, she thinks she’s out of the woods and is looking forward to the future, but still can’t excercise and easily looses her breath. She searches for optimism as her symptoms persist.
“I can’t express enough how terrifying this experience has been,” she says. “I wouldn’t wish that on anyone.”
Her lasting advice for families in Lawrence?
“Stay safe, take care of each other and wear a mask,” she says emphatically. “Just wear a damn mask.” LK
Sewing
Influence
