After two years of corona, L1 looks back with stories from patients and doctors. About Limburgers who endured the disease, sometimes survived against all odds, and about the doctors who stood by the bedside at the time.
Today the story of Bert Recker from Simpelveld, who miraculously overcame corona.
Life-threatening illness
When the pandemic broke out, he was one of the first to get corona. It started with a fever, followed by a visit to the GP who rushed him to the hospital 10 minutes later. “I came to the intensive care unit (ICU) with corona, double pneumonia and a pulmonary embolism. They immediately asked my partner if I wanted CPR in case I fell into a coma.”
suffocate 24 hours a day
The doctors thought that the chance was high. Bert got less and less air, he was choking. An anxious and unforgettable feeling. “That will always be in your head. The feeling of being underwater and getting no air. Every now and then you may go upstairs to gasp. But after that you are immediately immersed again. It went like this continuously. 24 hours a day.”
Afraid of the night
That he would last one day at all was against all the doctors’ expectations. “I stayed up all night out of willpower. I just thought, ‘If I fall asleep, I won’t be here. Then it’s over.’”
Overcrowded IC
After three days of IC, Bert was ‘stable’ enough for a room in the nursing ward. He didn’t do much better, but he occupied a bed in the ICU that was much needed for new corona patients. In the meantime, the hospital was already full of corona patients in critical condition.
Also read: A week in the Zuyderland hospital: the emergency room
Corona was still new
But things soon went horribly wrong in the nursing ward. The frightening, stuffy feeling that he would suffocate returned. Doctors could do little for him. Corona was new. Vaccinations and effective medicines were not yet available. They had already called his wife.
“It was horrible. But I kept insisting to myself and repeating: ‘Don’t fall asleep, then it’s done’. It got me through it.”
Not the same anymore
In exchange for that mental exhaustion, Bert stayed alive. But it was never the same. Escaping death twice has left a mental scar on him. After the hospital stay of eight weeks, he came home 17 kilos lighter. “I’m not the same anymore. I forget a lot and I’m emotional. That terrible time is constantly in your head. And I don’t think it will ever go away.”
More stories about two years of corona in: Limburg, you can see Saturday evening 5 March in the special of L1 television program Evening Guests at 6:30 PM.