She was careful. She washed her hands. She practised physical distancing. Still, she tested positive for COVID-19.
Kym Murphy was careful. She washed her hands. She practised physical distancing.
But the usually healthy, vibrant 54-year-old still contracted COVID-19, the illness caused by the novel coronavirus.
“I was so careful with handwashing,” said Murphy, a motorcycle enthusiast and mother of one who typically works as a school bus driver in Greater Saint John. “I didn’t go out. I went on walks with my dog. That’s it. I didn’t have any contact with anybody.
“I joked at the beginning that self-isolation wouldn’t affect me because I stay home a lot anyhow.”
Nevertheless, Murphy started experiencing what she calls “odd” symptoms on March 19, roughly one week after her last day of work on March 13. “It started with a congested headache,” she said.
Throbbing pain radiated from the back of her head up to her temples. Her mouth, throat and eyes were bone-dry. “I started to get extremely tired and achy with sweats and chills,” she said.
During a “surreal” week, from March 21 to 29, Murphy said she struggled to get out of bed.
Strange symptom
Murphy knew she was sick. But she had none of the symptoms that warrant testing for COVID-19, according to New Brunswick’s official diagnostic criteria.
“I didn’t have the fever, I didn’t have shortness of breath, I didn’t have the coughing,” she said. “But I just felt that there was something not right.”
What finally prompted her to call 811 was a symptom that didn’t appear anywhere in the government of New Brunswick information.
“I could taste and smell nothing,” she said.
Murphy placed a few drops of tea tree oil on her hand; her nose barely registered the pungent aroma. That loss of sensation could be a symptom of COVID-19, a friend had warned.
“When that happened to me, I called 811,” she said.
‘I’m going to die by myself’
Murphy got an appointment the next day, on March 26, at a testing centre on Loch Lomond Road in Saint John’s east end. The centre was like “a tented drive-thru,” she said, staffed by security guards and nurses in hazmat suits.
Afterward, she went home, firmly believing she would test negative.
“I thought, ‘I can’t wait to get this negative news and get on with my life, knowing that I just had a bad flu,'” she said.
The foll