A year ago we all felt fairly safe from COVID-19.  The virus was impacting other parts of the world.  We left for spring break thinking we would return to school as usual after a week of relaxing, but then everything changed.

As the virus raged this year, people we go to school with, work with, and even live with have contracted the coronavirus. 

Assistant Principal Robert Quach became ill with the coronavirus the first part of January.  He said he was exposed on a Friday and started having symptoms by the following Tuesday.  He was sick for eight days. 

“It felt like a very heavy flu–lots of aches and pains,” Quach said.  “Luckily I never lost my sense of smell or taste.  If you have ever had mono, it felt like that but way worse.” 

Just as the national media has reported, the severity of the illness and length of time symptoms persisted varied widely among the SHS community.  

“After day eight I was feeling a bit better, but I think I have memory lapses from time to time– not able to quickly recall basic information as fast as before,” Quach said.   

Special education facilitator Ginny Wilson and her family all contracted the virus but had varying symptoms.

“It was crazy because it affected us all differently,” Wilson said  “I had terrible headaches, a cough and extreme nausea. This lasted about three weeks, and my cough persisted for about a month.¨ 

School isn’t the only place students and staff are potentially exposed to the virus. Many students got it from family members.

Junior Nate Frost became ill after his mother brought home the virus from work. 

“I was sick for two weeks, and it took me an additional two weeks to fully recover,” Frost said. “I never wanted to get sick, and the worst part about being sick was not being able to go anywhere.”

The failure to follow proper social distancing guidelines also contributed to some students getting sick.

“I was hanging out with friends, so I knew it was bound to happen,” junior Paige Baumgartner said.

Baumgartner fell ill after Christmas break. “I was sick for about two weeks, but I couldn’t taste or smell for about a month afterwards.” She also said the worst part about the virus was not being able to taste food and being tired all the time. 

Having to quarantine within families also created stress for students. Junior Jorge Acosta said he was not able to see his mom and dad for about a month because they were quarantined. 

“I thought my mom was going to die, in all seriousness, because health conditions run in my family,” Acosta said.

There have been more than 28,000,000 COVID-19 cases reported  throughout the country, and the virus has been attributed to more than 518,000 deaths. Fortunately the impact so far on campus has been fairly mild.