COVID-19 forces retired school teacher into coma, wheelchair

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (KAIT) - It is a battle that a retired teacher says has been tough, but she credits the power of prayer with helping her in her most difficult time.

Content partner KARK reported Pamela Paige was taken to a hospital in Jan. 2021 after she started having trouble breathing.

Paige said she believes she caught COVID outside the classroom.

“By the time they got me upstairs, they say they were going to have to ventilate me,” Paige told KARK. “She put both my hands on top of me and said, ‘Pray.’ And I did.”

She said she was in a coma for three months and nearly died on a ventilator. When she woke up, she did not know who she was.

“I had a trek. I was trying to mouth to her [Nurse], where am I? She said, ‘Oh, baby, you’re a miracle. You had COVID.”

Doctors said she had nerve damage and needs a wheelchair to get around, but that she did not have a stroke.

“I still have issues,” Paige told KARK. “I can’t lift my hand. I had none of these issues before COVID.”

Paige, who had pre-existing health conditions before she got sick, went home last July. However, she said her insurance does not pay for her therapy any longer.

She also said she did not get a full retirement, is not old enough for full disability, and does not have insurance. In spite of it, she says she won’t give up.

“I am a COVID survivor,” Paige told KARK.

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