36 Time March 30, 2020
CORONAVIRUS
IN SICKNESS
AND HEALTH
Living with a partner who may have
COVID-19 can test a relationship
BY MANDY OAKLANDER
days afTer reTurning home from an inTer
national trade show in Arizona, Jacob developed a
fever and a sore throat so raw it felt like hamburger
meat. He could barely sleep or eat. At the doctor’s
office, “they almost tackled him to get a mask on
him when he walked in the door,” his wife Caitlin
says. “The doctor told us it might be COVID19.”
That possibility put Caitlin in an impossible situ
ation. “I’m not supposed to be near him because
he’s sick, but he couldn’t take care of himself,” she
says. So she swallowed her anxiety, armed herself
with dis infecting wipes and became living proof of
love in the time of coronavirus. (To protect the small
businesses they work for, the couple, who are both
33, didn’t want their last names used.)
For the next few weeks, Caitlin woke up early
every day to force Jacob to eat and drink enough
that he wouldn’t get dehydrated, and returned to
their house in Colorado Springs on her lunch break
to do it again. Jacob took trips to the bathroom to
have coughing fits, which would sometimes make
him vomit; she wiped down the toilet with disin
fectant. She worried constantly. She did laundry
constantly. And she did it all without masks, which
had long ago sold out. Caitlin struggled to keep her
distance. “We haven’t kissed since he got sick,” says
Caitlin. “I sneak up behind him and give him hugs
from behind. We handsanitize and hold hands.”
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention offers guidance for people taking care
of loved ones who have or are suspected to have
COVID19, but the reality is often messier than the
guidelines allow. The sick person should stay in a
dedicated room and use a bathroom that needn’t
be shared. (What if there’s no spare?) Caretakers
should clean counters, doorknobs, toilets, phones
and keyboards every day—and they should always
wear a face mask and gloves (good luck finding
these now) when in contact with a sick person’s
bodily fluids.
When Rowan Tekampe, a 30yearold mortician,
found out they may have been exposed to COVID
19 during a recent hospital stay in Sarasota, Fla.,
their fever, cough, shortness of breath and body
aches suddenly seemed more serious. They weren’t
able to get tested at that point, but their doctor
said their symptoms sounded like COVID19 and
recommended they go into quarantine.
They sat down with their wife Emily Tekampe,
who is recovering from cancer, and told her she
needed to leave their apartment and stay with her
dad for a while. “We’ve been together for 11 years,
and we haven’t really been apart,” Rowan says. “But
if you’re with someone whose immune system is
compromised, you can’t take that risk.” Emily didn’t
want to leave. “Your first instinct is to take care of
your spouse,” she says. “They’re sick and weak.
How can they take care of themself ?” But Rowan
wouldn’t take no for an answer.
They’ve been apart for weeks now, but Emily
makes Rowan text her their temperature every hour.
The couple FaceTimes constantly. “If I didn’t have
the ability to videochat with them, I don’t know
what I would do,” Emily says. “It’s really terrifying
to leave somebody like that when they’re sick.”
Joe Faraldo, a personalinjury attorney and se
nior citizen, was friends with the man who became
New Jersey’s first fatality from the new coronavirus.
He still doesn’t know why he recently fell ill with
a fever and cough, and is awaiting his COVID19
test results. In the meantime, he and his wife have
holed up in their Queens, N.Y., apartment. “We’re
not going out of this building for anything,” he says.
Faraldo’s wife wears a mask and wakes him up every
three hours to take Tylenol. She changes the sheets
when he sweats through them. She makes soup.
“I told her she shouldn’t be sleeping in the bed,
and finally she listened,” Faraldo says. As for her
own health, “she’s not concerned. She’s just wor
ried about me.” •