One expectant mom thought it would be okay not to wear a mask while out in public even though it was mandatory while she was working as a hairdresser in her salon.
However, despite following the rules while at work, her whole family ended up contracting COVID-19. Now, in an interview with WTNH, she is sharing her story so that people learn from her mistakes.
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Their symptoms initially started out mimicking their seasonal allergies, but then their almost 2-year-old daughter fell very ill and as a result, they got tested. According to Vanessa Geheb, all of the tests came back positive.
“Everlee will just scream out in pain and then pull at her head or pull at her tummy. Then every once in a while, she’ll go, ‘Brrrrr, brrrr, told, told’ and I think she’s getting those weird body chills,” Geheb said of her daughter’s symptoms.
And although neither she, her husband, nor their daughter has any underlying health issues, the pregnant soon-to-be mom of two is understandably nervous about the situation her family is in. Geheb is nervous she’ll get too sick to carry her unborn child to term.
“It’s a trip,” Geheb said of getting COVID-19 while pregnant. “This has been a trip. Every cell in my body hurts. I can’t keep anything down. I try to take vitamins, they come right back up. The only thing I can do is eat ice and popsicles at this point.”
Now Geheb regrets ever thinking it was okay not to wear a mask. She is also urging others to learn from her mistakes.
“I wish I could go back — and this makes me emotional, I don’t know why — but I wish I could go back and wear a mask every single second of every single day. I would not want to risk infecting another pregnant person with this anxiety of what could happen to your baby or even infecting another child.”
According to the mom, her daughter is now recovering, as is her husband, who is still dealing with bouts of exhaustion. However, Geheb is still battling the virus.
As the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report, “an MMWR study suggests that pregnant women with COVID-19 are more likely to be hospitalized and are at increased risk for intensive care unit admission and receipt of mechanical ventilation than nonpregnant women.”
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However, masks are an easy and effective way to prevent the spread of COVID-19.
The “CDC recommends that people wear cloth face coverings in public settings and when around people who don’t live in your household, especially when other social distancing measures are difficult to maintain” because masks “may help prevent people who have COVID-19 from spreading the virus to others and they are most likely to reduce the spread of COVID-19 when they are widely used by people in public settings.”