(bright music)
- I decided, when it came time,
to tell my loved ones that I had COVID-19,
I decided to reach out to my eldest brother first.
He is also an essential worker.
He's a bus driver for New Jersey Transit,
and I decided he would be a good family member
to talk to first because he understood the pressure
of having to physically show up to work
and put yourself at risk for contracting the virus,
and so, one of the things he and I discussed
was whether I should tell my mother,
and my instinct was to wait to tell her
until I had gotten better,
and he agreed with that instinct
because my mother lives in Florida, she's retired,
and I was very concerned that if I told her I had symptoms
and I suspected I had COVID,
that she would become so worried and so anxious,
and there wasn't much she could do,
really, to help me, from Florida,
and so, I, you know, kind of
had this image that she would worry herself endlessly,
maybe call me seven times a day to check up on me,
you know, because she would be worried and concerned and,
but that also would've been a lot during that time,
so I decided to hold off on telling her until I was better,
and so, that's what I did.
I let her know, probably after 10 or 11 days,
after, you know, I had been cleared to go back to work,
and she was still very anxious and very worried
after I told her,
but I think, you know, she tool some solace and reassurance
in the fact that I was better, and working again,
so that was how I decided, you know, to tell my loved ones.
I think in terms of my decision about friends
and who to tell,
I definitely decided to tell my close friends
who lived in our neighborhood
because I suspected that I would need their help
at some point, and that turned out to be true.
I did need their help at some point,
so that was a wise decision, looking back,
but there was also people that I decided
not to tell right away,
and so, you know, for me,
my story is tell who you feel safe telling.
Tell who you think can handle the stress
and the anxiety of knowing,
and, you know, you can always decide to tell them later,
or not, you know, it's your personal story,
it's your personal decision.
There's no right or wrong.
(bright music)
For my colleagues, I did decide to tell
a few close colleagues at work,
and they were wonderful, they were amazing.
They would check up on me.
One, you know, sent me a prayer,
which was very touching to me.
I'm a spiritual person, and,
you know, it's something,
some of them were ill with COVID as well,
and I found that really helpful
because they would tell me about their course of symptoms
and they would kind of tell me what to look out for
and I would share my course of symptoms with them,
so, you know, again, I didn't tell everyone at work,
I told my colleagues that I felt close to,
but everyone I told was incredibly supportive,
very caring, very kind, and that helped,
that definitely, all of that kindness and support,
it helped me during those days.
(bright music)