Defeating COVID like returning from ‘Dracula’s coffin’ – Herald and News

When Diane Eastman Shockey is someplace where people arent wearing masks, she tells them she is recovering from COVID-19.

And they step back, theyre wide-eyed and they say Oh, Im sorry and back up like Im Typhoid Mary, she laughed.

Shockey, 67, is also known as No. 201: the 201st person in Klamath County to test positive for the coronavirus. Her symptoms became apparent August 1, nearly a week after an outdoor family gathering of nine relatives, despite the fact that she and her husband, Orville, who she calls Ray, had been conscientiously wearing masks, washing hands and taking other precautions.

Shockey believes she may have been infected by her niece, a nurse practitioner who works in a health facility. When her niece returned home after the gathering, she was tested and found positive with the virus.

The Shockeys and others were notified through contact tracing. At that time everyone was asymptomatic. According to doctors, it can take up to 14 days before someone shows symptoms.

Nearly a week later, after testing negative, Shockey hoped she had escaped contracting the virus. But that changed quickly.

I thought it was smoke in the air, Shockey said from the outside deck of her Running Y home, seated more than six feet away and wearing her mask. I think I did something a lot of people do. I thought it was something else, not coronavirus.

Days later, she knew she had it.

I was very ill, she said. I got a ... serious case.

Because the Shockeys had lived in Eagle Point for several years before returning to the Klamath Basin three years ago, they teleconferenced with doctors in Medford.

She self-isolated from Ray, afraid they could infect one another.

Symptoms began to manifest: a dry cough, headache, hard body aches. Because she has asthma, Shockey and her husband worried as the symptoms increased in intensity. She started on various drugs. By August 4 her temperature reached 100 degrees. On August 6, she woke up in the middle of the night with a temperature of 104.

Shockey used ice packs to try to cool herself down, which can be dangerous. Doctors told her if it spiked to 104.1 she would need to be hospitalized. It never got that high but she said the fever was unrelenting.

Shockey said she experienced vomiting, nausea, dizziness. She downed Tylenols. She hurt and was fatigued.

I felt like I was in Draculas coffin with the blood being sucked out of me in the middle of the night when I woke up with a 104-degree temperature, she said. I honestly think I was in a delirium. The fatigue its a bone-numbing fatigue. You feel like theres nothing you can do.

Once the diagnosis was confirmed, Shockeys husband waited a few days before informing their daughter, Abigail.

Abigail, who earned her doctorate from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in microbiology, had studied the evolution of infectious diseases. She lives and works in Madison as a bioinformatician, a person who analyzes biological data. She and father tried to keep positive despite their doubts and fears.

Life at home also became more complicated.

Ray eventually contracted COVID-19 too, though they had isolated from one another. He became sick with aches and fever for about a week and had to stay home.

Both tried to stay out of the hospital, mostly to avoid infecting others, but they wavered as their symptoms increased.

And then, in mig-August, the fever broke.

I started getting better, she said. It took about 10 days to turn the corner.

Shockey has now had three days without a fever and 10 days without symptoms. She remains concerned about lingering effects, including nerve pain in her feet and calves. Her heart rate is high, 100 to 120 beats per minute, but doctors believe that will eventually return to normal. She said she has coughed up phlegm with spider-like blood clots.

As she did before she was infected, Shockey advocates the use of facial masks, believes in social distancing, wearing rubber gloves, washing hands and meticulously wiping down surfaces, cell phones and even credit cards because I dont want anybody to get this.

Shes frustrated by people who decline to take precautions.

I think they think theyre strong and, if they get it, it wont be serious. Im here to say its not worth it. They think theyre going to beat the odds. Its just not worth it to take the risk, Shockey said.

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Defeating COVID like returning from 'Dracula's coffin' - Herald and News