EDINBURGH, Ind. — Michael Herron has been a firefighter for 30 years and is now a chief in Edinburgh. He’s seen a little bit of everything.
“I’d like to think that I have been in some situations that would warrant a guy to be a little scared or panicked over the years as a firefighter,” said Herron.
But none of it prepared him for COVID-19.
“It happened so quick and I was so sick so fast that it was frightening. I have never been so scared,” said Herron.
He says he started to feel sick in early November.
“I had a temperature off and on that day, and then by that evening I just felt terrible. I just felt bad. Somebody aches but mainly fever, headache, my eyes were blurry. It was hard to focus,” said Herron.
And it was starting to get hard for him to breathe. While doctors confirmed it was COVID-19, he was hesitant about a stay in the hospital.
“I have a five-year-old granddaughter and I knew that if I spent any time in the hospital, and to be quite frank, if I didn’t make it out, the last time I saw her would have been the last time I saw her,” he said.
His wife made what may have been a lifesaving 911 call.
They had IVs in both arms, they were giving me oral medications, hanging fluids, trying to get my O2 saturation up and keep it up,” said Herron.
For nine days, he was in the hospital. He pulled through, thanks to those doctors and nurses.
“I think they had everything they could give to a COVID patient,” said Herron.
"They were really good about taking care of me. One was excellent. His name was Kevin and I don’t know if I’ll see him again. Whenever you are in there isolated and you do not have contact to anybody else and I told him 'you really pulled me through this.'”
Herron is still recovering and he plans to go back to work. He also hopes people will continue to take precautions.
“If you just wear a mask, if you just wash your hands. If you just social distance,” said Herron. “I can tell you, if you get it to the degree that I had it, it’s serious business.”