Schuylkill County Common Pleas Judge Christina Hale didn’t know if she would be alive to share her experience with COVID-19 with others.

“I really thought at one point I’m going to die from this. I got scared,” the 44-year-old said last week.

She tested positive for the virus Nov. 25. She said she had taken precautions and didn’t know how she contracted it.

Hale describes herself as “a very active, healthy person.”

Initial symptoms of headaches, chills and a fever hit her like “a wave” on Nov. 22.

Body aches and uncontrollable shaking soon followed. She went to Cornerstone Healthcare in Frackville the next day for a COVID-19 test. She wasn’t surprised when she received an email that she tested positive.

Her husband and daughter also later tested positive for the virus and have also recovered. Her two Labradors provided her with unconditional love she needed and didn’t get sick.

“It was horrible. Absolutely horrible. I was never so sick in my life,” she said.

Contracting the virus was “a thousand times worse than either the flu or pneumonia,” Hale said.

She had 103.3 degree fever for nine straight days.

“I didn’t think a human body could have a fever for that long,” she said. The fever would break and restart.

It seemed like a never-ending cycle for those nine days. She ate little during that time except for crackers and other light foods. She managed to eat bites of Thanksgiving dinner to provide a sense of normalcy for her daughter. She drank lots of Gatorade.

Family and friends dropped off food to the family on the front porch. Friends and co-workers called and texted to see how she was.

“They were so worried about me,” she said.

Speaking on the phone was at times exhausting to the point where she could only talk for 10 or 20 seconds.

“It took too much energy and effort to speak,” she said.

Family and her doctor discussed when she would need to visit the hospital if her condition deteriorated. At one point her oxygen level dropped to 88%, causing her family to prepare to call an ambulance. Her condition improved shortly thereafter. Hale said she didn’t want to leave her daughter even though she could not care for her at the time. If she would be hospitalized, she didn’t know where it would be, due to the high number of hospitalizations.

Hale was given antibiotics, steroids, inhalers, codeine cough syrup, and took Tylenol and Advil, both of which were ineffective in fighting the fever.

Once the fever subsided, Hale began to feel better and regained her appetite. She also worked from home.

After the 14-day quarantine, she went outside for a walk but didn’t go far.

“I could barely go outside down the driveway, which was about 20 yards. It was at least six weeks until I could feel back to normal,” she said.

Hale admits that is a relative statement because she still is not without lingering symptoms.

“I still get frequent headaches. I still get exhaustion.”

When she first went back to work at the courthouse, she didn’t have the energy to work the entire day.

“I was that exhausted,” she said.

Hale said she is sharing her personal fight with COVID-19 to provide insight to the public.

“COVID is such an emotional topic right now. I was one of the lucky ones. There are people who get it much, much worse,” she said.

Hale doesn’t want to “tell people what to do. I am not going to preach to them,” she said.

She commended county administration and President Judge William E. Baldwin on efforts to protect the public and staff.

Cheryl Pastucka, Hale’s mother, said she wanted to go inside the house and care for her daughter, but Hale would not permit her.

“She didn’t want me to get this. I felt very protected,” Pastucka said.

Knowing her daughter was so sick was troubling to her. “It’s frightening. It has power. It does not discriminate and all of us are (susceptible),” Pastucka said.