Tony Scott - Along Came COVID - Love and Loss in the 2020 Pandemic

“You’ve been gaga over her forever.”

Josh didn’t notice the levity. “I can’t imagine what I would do if I lost her now!” Tears were running down his cheeks as he drooped in the chair. “That means I would lose Cori too.”

“You know this is getting to me too. I had to do a cesarean section to save the baby of a woman dying from COVID.” Josh heard the creak of his recliner.

“I know, I heard.”

“It’s eerie that I took a baby out of a woman and then just left her. I had a baby but didn’t think about the woman. Usually, we make sure she has pain relief, something to eat and drink, and that her vital signs are stable. I didn’t do any of that. I just sat and held the baby for a long time.”

“There’s nothing about this pandemic that is usual, Ricky. I just hope it doesn’t get more unusual for Faith.”

“If it’s any consolation, Josh, she’s not progressing much, so that’s good.”

“This is the worst thing that could happen. I don’t want her sick. I want her and Cori to stay in my life. I knew this whole thing was too good to be true.”

“I get that. I don’t know what to say.”

“In some ways, Faith looks a little like Reyenne. Her eyes and her color. This is a horror movie.”

“Don’t get too far ahead, Josh. Keep your cool. She needs you to keep your cool, and you need you to keep your cool.”

“I’m trying.”

“Have you talked to your family?”

“Yes. Not to my parents much, but to my sister often. I talked to Faith’s dad, Jim, and to her sister, Natalie. They’re all freaking out. You’re my only sane sounding board.”

“Let’s keep it that way.”

Josh took a deep breath. “It’s good I tested positive. I mean, I don’t want to be sick either. But it means I can visit her, which most other family members are not allowed to do. She is even pleasant in this mess she’s in.”

“I’ve come to enjoy and admire her,” Ricky said. “She’s bright, funny, and like you say, beautiful. Her compassion shows.”

“I think she will make an amazing doctor,” Josh said. “I hope I can measure up. She wants to do maternal-fetal medicine.”

“I can believe that. This seems to be her niche."

Josh stumbled over the next part. "First, she has to survive COVID. Then, she has to survive without any residual effects, which I am reading some patients get. I’m terrified that one of the two outcomes could ruin all this. What if Cori doesn’t survive this?”

Ricky was quiet for a few seconds. “I think they both have a good chance of survival like a number of others we’ve had. We haven’t had a fetal death, so that doesn’t seem to be a problem. From the information Haley has, no one is talking about fetal demise without maternal demise.”

Josh’s heart jumped. “I don’t know what I’ll do if she dies.”

“I don’t either. Think of the birthday party. I’m still amazed by that.”

“Everybody loves her. I love her.” Josh sighed again.

“We have to be calm for her,” Ricky said. “I have to admit, I find that hard. I have not been right since I held Reyenne’s hand while she died. There was nothing to do and I felt totally worthless. And we had Yankton as the attending, who we couldn’t even find. I felt hung out to dry.”

Josh somehow stumbled upon some levity. “You are totally worthless.”

“OK,” Ricky snorted. “It sounds like we have solved all the world’s problems.”

“Talk to you later. Thanks, Ricky.”

Brian knew he needed to talk. Peggy was not the ideal person, but it was someone who could be accessed without an appointment in late morning. Brian’s office had finished early, thankfully, and he entered the fellows’ closet, rattling the window.

“Good morning, Brian,” Peggy said. “What’s on your mind?”

“Faith is sick.”

“Tell me about it. We are all stunned and terrified.”

“I’m stunned. Why are you guys terrified?”

Because of her immunosuppression.” Peggy said. “Between pregnancy and Humira, we don’t know what we are facing.”

“And we’ve had deaths.”

“Yes sir, three,” she said. “Considering I had never had a maternal death in forty years of practice, this is daunting. I am even having bad dreams.”

“Do you think she will survive?”

“I hope. At least she didn’t crash the first day like two others. She’s gradually getting worse, but slowly enough that I hope she will turn this around soon.”

Brian’s hand trembled as he scratched his ear, and he felt his heart in his chest. “We didn’t think this epidemic was going to amount to much, and now it has become historic. Somebody said we could have two million deaths.”

“I hope we don’t get to that.”

“What about Faith terrifies you?”

“She has almost no lymphocytes,” Peggy said. “In non-pregnant patients, low lymphocytes and high D-dimer is a bad combination. The problem with D-dimer is that it is sky high in pregnancy anyway, so the significance in pregnancy is obscure in my mind.”

“Crap.” Brian sat for a moment. “What if she dies?”

“Many of our spirits will be broken, including this team, her family, and especially Josh. I’m not sure some aren’t broken already that we don’t know about.”

“I heard you saved a baby.”

“Yes. Ricky and Ann did. He’s one that I am worried might be particularly fragile.”

“I’m surprised. He seems more resilient. I haven’t seen a soft side.”

“This is where you could use more interaction with the team. Let them talk. Let them verbalize about things besides patients, medicines and blood tests.”

“I don’t want to hear that,” Brian said. “I don’t need to hear their stories. Just like NA meetings, and some of the literature that the NA leader passes out. It doesn’t help me to hear or read about someone else’s problems. I just don’t need the darkness now.”

“Don’t you need the light side also? Ricky is often hilarious.”

“I don’t want the rest of the story.”

“How do I help you open your eyes. What are some of the NA survivors telling you about life?”

“Crap. Then more crap. All they can think about is using again. There is one lady in my group who says she has been clean for a decade, and she still thinks about it every damned day.”

“My brother-in-law quit smoking twenty years ago and says he doesn’t go a day without thinking about a cigarette. I don’t have any personal experience like that, but I think I hear what you are saying.”

“They never manage to tell me how they avoid falling off the wagon,” Brian said. “It sounds like it never ends.”

“What has Pain Management said about it?”

“That it’s something that will be with me for the rest of my life.”

“Like cancer of the pancreas and lymphoma.”

“Why do you always come back to that?”

“Because we are talking about the same kind of disease. Like diabetes. Once you have it, you have it. Unfortunately, this is not like appendicitis or bladder infection. You don’t get cured.”

“But lymphoma patients sometimes get a bone marrow transplant and never hear about it again.”

Peggy raised her index finger, “But they have to watch for it around every corner. I bet they think about it every single day, worry about every visit to the oncologist, dread every CT scan, and deal with the effects of the transplant.”

Brian felt defeated. He didn’t like the idea that this was a serious illness, especially a chronic illness that could be terminal. “The real kicker is the stigma. It’s not like cancer of the pancreas or lymphoma in that people looked at those patients differently. I get the sense that people think of me as causing this illness and choosing not to get well.”