Sarah Mehmi
Lynette Smith, aged 38, and 1 year-old son, Hugo, were diagnosed with COVID-19 on Thursday 2nd of April. Lynette and husband, Graeme, have three children, the youngest being Hugo. Continue reading to find out how this wonderful family coped and recovered from coronavirus.
a coffee shop. Photograph by Sarah Mehmi.
On Tuesday 24th March, Lynette’s colleague suddenly became extremely and acutely unwell. Lynette works for the NHS, and knowing lots of people with the symptoms of COVID-19, she wasn’t worried.
Then on 27th March, her sister’s birthday, her colleague had to take time off due to having Coronavirus. She was concerned, but told herself not to worry.
On Wednesday 1st of April, she realised how exhausted she was getting from doing the smallest of things and remained this way for the rest of the day. Then dramatically, 1 year old Hugo started screaming. He couldn’t stop screaming, nothing could calm him, and Lynette and Graeme became very concerned.
On Thursday 2nd of April, Hugo developed a rash all over his body. They rang the local GP.
After hearing the story, the doctor requested for Lynette and Hugo to come down to Accident and Emergency in the nearest hospital. From there they had to wait a long 8 hours waiting for a doctor. When the doctor finally called them, they took large samples of Hugo’s blood and then tested him and Lynette for COVID-19. Unfortunately, the results were positive.
“I was so sad when I found out. All you hear is bad news stories and deaths, but for us we were poorly for a period of time and we soon recovered,” said Lynette Smith.
The family had 4/5 days in bed due to the illness. On Tuesday 7th, Graeme became unwell too and the parents ended up having to change shifts for looking after the kids. Hugo’s older sibling, 8 year old James and 5 year old Daniel had a great time. Whilst their parents were sick, they ate all the sweets in the house. But they also played a key role in their recovery: they made dinner, looked after Hugo, and did all of the house chores.
On 9th April the family felt a lot better, but still very unwell for another week.It left Lynette with continuous chest pain for a fortnight and she apparently ‘slept more than she had in eight years’.
James and Daniel did feel slightly sick, but it was something that Calpol could fix. The most poorly was Hugo and Lynette out of the whole family, but it also mentally affected her parents. They were very upset, and having previous medical careers themselves, they were extremely worried about the consequences.
Lynette said the most difficult thing was herself and Graeme both being ill and having to take care of the family at the same time. One of the side effects of having Coronavirus for Lynette was that she lost all sense of taste and smell.
Lynette’s advice for anyone going through a similar situation is to not read the news, go to bed, take care of yourself, eat fruit and veg and vitamins, don’t lie on you back for long periods of time because that will worsen your lungs, and purchase a pulse oximeter. She found the pulse oximeter most helpful because it is really good for figuring out how unwell you are. You could feel well, but actually very sick. The pulse oximeter tells you whether or not you are. Also, rest, relax and de-stress, the worst thing you can do is stress.
Thankfully, the family are almost fully recovered more than a month later.
