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therapy was painful," said Pambuan as she learned to walk again and regain her strength. Her rehab regimen also included speech therapy because she had to learn how to swallow, the result of being on a ventilator and having a feeding tube. She was determined to walk out of the hospital without any assistance. Four days before Christmas, she slowly walked out of the hospital to joyful cheers and applause from nurses, doctors, staff, and a flurry of media attention. Tears streamed down her face as Pambuan was hugged by many of her colleagues with her daughter at her side. Over the course of eight months, Pambuan had lost more than 30 pounds. She continues to wear a pulse oximeter and remains on oxygen. "The virus damaged my lungs," said Pambuan, who still does physical, occupational, and recreational therapy six days a week. "I want to move fast. I have to learn to move slow or I can feel my oxy- genation going down." "I consider this my second life," said Pambuan, who credited her family, and especially her daughter, for pulling her through. "It's a miracle." Katherina Faustino, RN 3 St. Rose Dominican Hospital Henderson, Nev. on the last friday in July, ICU nurse Katherina Faustino woke up with a scratchy throat, but she didn't think anything of it. She had just finished working three night shifts in a row at St. Rose Dominican Hos- pital in Henderson, Nev., where she has worked for 21 years, including more than 15 years in the ICU. Her ICU had been a Covid-19 unit since Nevada went into lockdown on April 1. She thought the scratchiness was from wearing the same N95 mask for 12 hours during each shift. Then she got a fever and felt worse. Meanwhile, over the weekend, her husband, brother, and her husband's parents, who all live with her, started developing Covid-19 symptoms. The only one who didn't have any symptoms yet was her 10-month-old daughter. Nevada was in the midst of its first surge that summer. Covid testing was limited, so Faustino, then 46 years old, had to wait until Monday to get tested. The next day, the rest of the adult family members got tested. Everyone tested positive. She wore a surgical mask at all times, hoping that her baby would not get Covid. (She could not find an N95 at that time.) Faustino's employer had been rationing personal protective equipment (PPE), asking nurses to wear the same PPE for an entire shift or until it was soiled. Faustino worried about infecting her family, so she had followed a careful decontamination routine when she got home from work: taking everything off in the garage before running into the house and then showering before she interacted with any family members. "But I still took Covid home to my family." "Out of all five adults in my household, I had the worst symp- toms," recalled Faustino, who said the rest of her family had fevers but no respiratory issues. "I got fevers and diarrhea. I lost my sense of taste and smell. I had breathing issues and I coughed so much I couldn't sleep." At her lowest point, she filled her bathroom with steam and lay on the floor to ease her breathing. "I had a fever of 105," said Faustino. "I was trying to treat myself. I was living on Tylenol and I couldn't eat. I lost 10 pounds." For the first week and a half, Faustino was unable to get any medications to treat her symptoms. She had to convince doctors that she did not have the flu. After she was finally prescribed steroids and cough syrup with codeine, she was able to get some rest and sleep. She was also able to monitor her oxygen levels due to a helpful coworker who had recovered from Covid and loaned Faustino her oxygen saturation probe. The experience spurred her to speak out about getting Covid and about the importance of PPE to protect nurses. Although Faustino does not consider herself to be a public speaker, she began talking to reporters about her experience and concerns about PPE. During her recovery, she did her first inter- view with a reporter and has gone on to do other interviews about staffing issues and Covid. On her third week off from work, Faustino's baby started having fevers. She took her to the ER and her worst fears came true: Her baby tested positive. Luckily, she only had fevers for a few days and never had any trouble breathing. "It made me feel guilty that she got Covid," said Faustino. "But she's a healthy baby overall and does not have any immune system problems." Faustino still had a severe cough, so she stayed home for another week before going back to work. Her cough lingered for weeks, but she had been medically cleared by her employer to return to work. Her chest X-ray showed no permanent lung damage. Her first day back, her stamina was low. "I wasn't 100 percent for a while," recalled Faustino, who celebrated her 47th birthday in Sep- tember. "I didn't have that pep. I'm usually zoom, zoom, zoom, but I was short of breath a lot and walking slower." By November she was back to her usual stamina—just in time for the huge surge of Covid cases that swept the country in December. For weeks, Faustino contended with three ICU patient assignments at one time, stretching her nursing skills to the brink and exhausting her emotionally and physically. She even took on extra shifts to help out her colleagues. Luckily, by mid-February, she was back to caring for two ICU patients. Today she doesn't feel any residual illness. And her family is fully recovered. Chuleenan Svetvilas is a communications specialist at National Nurses United. J A N U A R Y | F E B R U A R Y | M A R C H 2 0 2 1 W W W . N A T I O N A L N U R S E S U N I T E D . O R G N A T I O N A L N U R S E 15 "I wasn't 100 percent for a while. I didn't have that pep. I'm usually zoom, zoom, zoom, but I was short of breath a lot and walking slower."