The road to recovery after surviving COVID-19

LEXINGTON, Ky. (WTVQ) – Many people don’t even catch it during Governor Andy Beshear’s daily Coronavirus briefings. But it’s a number that may say more than just about anything about how far the state has come during the two month COVID-19 shutdown.

It’s the number of people who have recovered from the disease. And while recovery is exciting, it’s just the beginning of a long process according to a survivor who has been there.

Sheila Thornsberry and Family

Sheila Thornsberry sums it all up fairly quickly, “I’m gonna get better I’m gonna get back to where I was, but it’s great to be home.” That’s because Sheila spent more than three weeks in the hospital fighting for her life and most of the time was on a ventilator.

“I have no recollection of those 18 days what so ever” Sheila can’t remember the 18 days on a ventilator. Either way she has left the hospital, and she left in style. “I cried the whole time. I’m just going to be honest” That’s because hospital staff lined the halls and applauded as she walked down a red carpet toward her children and husband. Sheila added, “My kids were at the end of that red carpet I was walking on and I couldn’t get to the end of that red carpet them fast enough.”

The COVID-19 virus ends of taking most of the person’s energy and strength and so now Sheila is focused on getting hers back. “I’m walking on my own. Doing stairs once a day, that’s a challenge.”

Sheila Thornsberry and her Children

By career, she’s a Physician’s Assistant. Being a patient was very different. Now she says everyone must do their part. “Wear your mask out in public, and the mask out in public is not to protect yourself it’s to protect everyone else.”

She added, that everyone has to go to the grocery store but you don’t want to bring home a deadly virus and infect your family.