Left: In April 2020 Debbie Kosta was on a ventilator for almost a month. Right: I m pushing through this COVID long-hauler disease by biking each day, says Kosta. Going from learning how to walk again to learning how to bike again took me a few months. Now I bike 24 miles up and down the Hudson. Image: Debbie Kosta; Agni Zotis
Updated July 17, 2021 at 7:38 PM ET
Debbie Kosta almost didn t survive COVID-19. In the early days of the pandemic, the 52-year-old was kept on a ventilator for over three weeks.
When she emerged from a coma and learned that she would pull through while another person in the hospital with her had died, Kosta was racked with guilt. She found herself asking, Why me?
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LULU GARCIA-NAVARRO, HOST: Anxiety, tension, helplessness - those are just some of the symptoms people with survivor s guilt experience. Survivor s guilt is known for affecting people like soldiers who come home from war or first responders who feel a sense of, why did I make it? - after a traumatic event. Now, after over 600,000 people died in this country, survivors of COVID-19 are asking themselves similar questions. Debbie Kosta of New York said when she got sick with the virus, she begged doctors to do all they could to keep her alive.
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