CARTERVILLE (WSIL) -- Every member of the Wallen family survived COVID-19, but Leslie Wallen, started the year in a coma.
The recovery is slow going for Leslie, who is now out of the hospital and enduring physical therapy.
"I crashed," said Wallen.
Wallen and her family, all came down with COVID-19, just days before Christmas.
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"We were super cautious people. I stayed at home with the kids, we home schooled our children full time with their schools, we were super cautious and yet we still, everyone in our household still got COVID. It was terrifying, and when I got it, I just knew that it was going to be a very scary situation for me."
The family mostly handled the illness without much setback. That is, except for Leslie.
"My husband was like Leslie you are really sick, you've got to go to the hospital, and I kept telling him, 'I can't move I can't move.'"
Outside of a quick conversation with her husband Phillip, she doesn't remember much after entering the ambulance.
"The only thing I remember next was talking to Phillip on the phone, and saying "I don't want to go on a ventilator, I'm scared, but I need you to do what you need to do to take care of me," Wallen explained. "I was terrified, you know, you watched on the news all the cases that happened and people passing away, people going on a vent and not coming off of one. It was my biggest fear."
Leslie ended up spending a month in a coma. When she woke up, she immediately noticed her feeding tube and a ventilator trach.
Fortunately, those were temporary, but she's since been dealing with more chronic complications.
"I didn't have feet problems before, I didn't know what happened to me, but I have severe peripheral neuropathy in both of my feet and it's really hard to deal with, it's excruciating pain."
She's now in physical therapy, trying to get herself back to where she was just 5 months ago.
"Your heart, your lungs, your muscles atrophy, so when you are finally able to move, it takes a lot more energy, a lot more endurance to get moving," said Physical Therapist Ruth Daly.
COVID has been hard on Leslie's body, but it's also taken a toll on her family.
"My little guy, even when I came home from the hospital, would wake up crying in the middle of the night and coming into our bedroom, and then finally I asked, I was like, 'What's going on, why are you upset why are you crying?', and he was like 'I'm terrified you're going to go back to the hospital and you're not going to leave."
"They're doing a lot better knowing that she's at home," said Phillip Wallen. "My daughter's 12, she's stepped up with a lot of responsibility through this whole thing. She's really been helpful at the house, getting things for Leslie, or letting me know, if I'm in another room, if Leslie is trying to do too much."
Leslie's therapist says it's her relentless attitude that's helping her progress so quickly.
"Attitude is 90% of therapy, and so she has a wonderful attitude, a very go get'em attitude," said Daly.
"I'm not staying at home and hibernating, I'm not going to be that person. I feel like after what happened to me, I got a second chance in life and I can't live in fear," said Wallen.
"As much of a challenge as this whole thing's been, I never realized how much strength she had," said Phillip Wallen.
Enough strength to revisit the simple joys of her life before.
"I stood up and with my husband's help and I was literally face to face with him, and I just hugged him, and he was just trying to hold on to me and all I wanted to do was hug him and I did. I hugged him and I cried and sobbed because it's the first time I got to do that and I've missed it so much."
Phillip said the ordeal makes you realize what's important in your life.
When Leslie woke up from her coma, she was shocked to find out she missed her daughter's dance competition. She says now her fight is all about getting back to life with her family.
