My family caught COVID-19. Here's what I wish I'd known

This is a First Person column by Meaghan Blanchard, an award-winning songwriter and digital marketing manager based in Prince Edward Island. For more information about CBC's First Person stories, please see the FAQ.

This past weekend, my husband, my one-year-old son and I contracted the COVID-19 virus while in Charlottetown for work.

We had booked an Airbnb, which lined up with a music event we were scheduled to perform at, and planned to keep things simple and be outdoors as much as possible.

We stayed two nights, and during that time went to a single grocery store and a liquor store (OK, two liquor stores), and we picked up takeaway coffee once. We took a stroll through two little shops, but for the most part we played in a park and went for walks around the city. We did not go out on the town. This was primarily a trip for work.

As we now live in the countryside, our son was delighted to see the faces of people walking by and he would smile and shout, "Hi! Hi! Hi!" to everyone we passed.

We wore masks the entire time, and my husband and I are both double-vaccinated against COVID-19. 

Healthy, until we weren't

When we returned home two days later, we were feeling healthy and fine. That is, until we weren't.

Our son spiked a sudden fever on Sunday morning, and my husband and I started to suddenly feel a bit congested. We called my husband's parents, who live around the corner, and said we might keep our distance for a day or two while we get over "this little bug." Then our babysitter called and said she was feeling really run down and was going to get a COVID-19 test to be safe. She had watched our son on one of the weekend nights.

Still, I didn't think too much about it. How often this has been the story, that friends and family get tested and it's always been negative — especially on P.E.I. When she called me back the next day, I almost dropped the phone. "Get your test results back yet?" I said. "Yes… it's positive," she said quietly.

My heart sank.

I tried to be calm, but the urge to hang up the phone and run to protect my son took over. I quickly said goodbye after asking her to keep in touch, and walked down the hall to tell my husband, whose eyes widened in fear.

We had picked up rapid tests from Access P.E.I. a week prior, so we sat down as a family and took them. Initially they were negative, but after leaving them out for the full 15 minutes, I saw the second pink line show up on all three of our tests. 

'You need to call 911'

On Monday, we were all starting to feel pretty terrible. Our son was congested, and his fever was up one moment and down the next. We put him down for his nap, and after 20 minutes of sleeping, I heard him cry out, but not in a way I'd ever heard before. It was half gurgle, half cry.

I ran up the stairs and he was sitting in his bed, face covered in mucus, and gasping for breath.

I grabbed him, screamed for my husband and ran down the stairs. I threw him into the arms of my husband and grabbed the phone. "Tom, what's wrong with him!" I screamed. Immediately I thought of all of the medical articles I had read about COVID patients whose oxygen levels dropped quickly.

I clumsily dialled 811 twice, and couldn't get through.

My husband locked eyes with me: "Meaghan, you need to call 911."

Tears pooled at the edges of my eyes. "This is not happening," I thought to myself.

The dispatcher picked up and I shouted, "Hello! My family just took rapid tests. We all have COVID, we think. My son woke up from his nap and he can't catch his breath. He's not breathing right! We need help. Should we get in the car and drive to the Emerg?" The dispatcher replied like a slingshot: "Ma'am, do NOT come to the hospital. The ambulance is on its way."

Even I couldn't dodge COVID

Now, if there were a person who would have been voted least likely to get COVID, I can say with confidence that my friends and family would have said that would have probably been me. Not because I would be voted an overly healthy person, but because for two years I have been completely and annoyingly hypervigilant around it.

For the better part of two years, I convinced myself that I could dodge COVID. We said no to countless events, birthday parties, barbecues and camping trips. Some days I would feel a little safer, and say yes to partaking in something, and then change my mind out of a complete anxiety attack in the days leading up to it.

I truthfully wish that I had spent more time thinking: 'OK, IF my family were to contract COVID, what would our plan be?' I locked myself in my house for months trying to avoid this virus, and yet here we are.- Meaghan Blanchard

I watched friends and family get back to enjoying more of life, and cried myself to sleep countless nights because I felt so alone — with a newborn, in fear and trapped by my own choice.

Eventually I felt safe enough to open up our family bubble in the fall of 2020, but it's been a challenge to make peace with feeling safe and partaking in society.

We got our PCR tests on Monday night, and were officially COVID-positive the next day.

For the last five days, we have both been battling an array of symptoms, while trying to watch our son and make sure he's breathing OK — fever, chills, congestion, fluid build-up in our lungs, headaches, muscle aches, cough, sore throat and terrible exhaustion.

For two nights, my son was not breathing correctly and could not clear his airway. Trying to teach an almost two-year-old to cough up what is in his lungs has proven to be harder than potty training. We would wake up and hear him struggling to catch his breath, and take him down into our bathroom, turn on the hot water and sit in the steam. 

Keep an eye on the weather

I don't want to share my story to scare you. I really don't. I know how hard it is to hear of children in distress.

I'm sharing my story because I honestly thought that if I did everything right, it wouldn't hit my family. I just don't think that is how this virus works. I once heard an epidemiologist say on a podcast that the COVID virus is akin to a forest fire, and it is going to always be looking for wood to burn. I believe it.

I truthfully wish that I had spent more time thinking: "OK, IF my family were to contract COVID, what would our plan be?" I locked myself in my house for months trying to avoid this virus, and yet here we are.

My husband said it best to me just a few weeks ago: It's like a rainy day. We look outside and see what we need to wear. Some days we put on a raincoat and a hat, and sometimes just a good pair of rubber boots will do. But sometimes, the weather is just not safe to be out in at all.

I think about that with Christmas coming up.

My one piece of advice: If you are feeling run down, don't write it off as nothing. The shame you will feel going back through who you have seen over the last four days, and how many lives you could have unintentionally altered, is truly devastating.

I also want to say that we wouldn't have made it through this experience without the support of our families, our friends, and Dr. Heather Morrison and her team. Through it all, we have felt very loved, and safe in that love. 

Happy holidays to you, and keep an eye on the weather. 

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