With a global death toll of more than two hundred thousand [1], not only has the novel coronavirus taken loved ones from millions of families, but it’s highly contagious nature has robbed them of the opportunity to be with them as they take their final breaths. Families around the world are instead forced to sit at home in quarantine while their grandparent, parent, sibling, or friend, must suffer alone in a hospital bed.

“We Hear You, Dad”

Abby Adair Reinhard, along with her three siblings, stayed on the phone with their father for thirty-six hours, listening to his labored breath.

Her father, Don Adair, was a retired attorney. He was the father of four and was highly involved in the lives of his five grandchildren. The 76-year-old had fallen at home a few days earlier and was in the hospital because of a minor infection. It was there that he developed a cough and a fever, and his health began deteriorating rapidly.

Reinhard called her three siblings, who live in Texas, North Carolina, and Denmark, and the kids sat on a conference call, reminiscing about past family trips and listening desperately to the sound of their father’s breathing. Throughout the entire heart-wrenching experience, Reinhard wrote her thoughts and emotions down.

“I have never loved and appreciated breath the way I love and appreciate breath right now,” she wrote [2].

After a long day and a half, her father finally succumbed to the virus. In a scene that is becoming increasingly common around the world, they held a small, five-minute burial at the family plot. Her siblings could not be there and had to be sent a video of the proceedings after they were over.

Read: He said goodbye to his mother over walkie-talkie as she died of coronavirus

The New Normal

Sadly, Reinhard’s story is one of thousands of others that are just as heartbreaking. Families of patients all over the world are being forced to say goodbye to loved ones virtually since they are unable to visit them in the hospital. In many countries, deceased patients are being buried with no family presence at all, and those who are left behind must grieve alone, unable to visit their family members to comfort them.

Andrea Cerato, who works in a funeral home in Milan, Italy, says that the novel coronavirus kills twice.

“First, it isolates you from your loved ones right before you die. Then, it doesn’t allow anyone to get closure.” [3]

Palliative care specialist, Dr. Rachel Clarke, explained that the novel coronavirus is profoundly reshaping the experience of dying.

“Coronavirus patients in intensive care cannot be visited by families – the infection risk is too great. That means loved ones are cut off from their families at precisely the time they need them most. Tablets, smartphones, videolinks of every kind are being used as alternatives to face to face contact, but of course cannot replace it,” she said [4].

Read: For survivors of severe COVID-19, beating the virus is just the beginning

Stay Home, Be Patient

Reinhard shared the thoughts and emotions that she had recorded during those nightmarish thirty-six hours, in hopes that it would impress upon Americans how horrible this virus is, and encourage them to remain patient as health officials attempt to get it under control.

“To experience that threat on an emotional level makes it more real,” she said. “To be 6 feet apart from your mom when you’re crying? I haven’t been able to hug my mom.” [2]

Reinhard will never forget the sound of her father as he gasped for breath, his lungs filled with mucus. 

“I hear myself gasping as well. He, no longer in his body. And I, not quite in mine.” [2]

As millions of Americans are becoming restless, worried, and anxious to return to normal life, it is stories like these- stories of healthy individuals who had many more years of life left to enjoy with their friends and families- that we must remember.

If we act too hastily, thousands more like Don Adair will be taken from us. It is now, more than ever, that we must continue to stay home and do our part to prevent the spread of the virus to protect the people we love.

Keep Reading: ‘Inseparable’ Couple Married 51 Years Both Die Of Coronavirus Six Minutes Apart

The post ‘We hear you, dad’: A daughter stays on the phone for hours and hours as her father dies alone from coronavirus appeared first on The Hearty Soul.