新妈妈们通常会经历许多不眠之夜、疲惫之夜来照顾她们的新生儿。但是对于瑞娜·洛佩兹来说，过去的五个月是一场残酷的噩梦——她被诊断患有新冠肺炎(新型冠状病毒肺炎)刚生完孩子两个月。

“我发烧了。我打了个寒战。当我有任何动作的时候，我会非常头晕目眩——坐下，站起来，只是转动我的头。我开始恶心了。我的身体很痛，”瑞娜说。

鲁道夫·洛佩兹

31岁的瑞娜·洛佩兹在被诊断出患有新冠肺炎之前两个月生下了她的第三个孩子，一个名叫诺亚的儿子。

这位31岁的男子艾滋病病毒检测呈阳性冠状病毒六月。她在生下儿子诺亚几个月后，住进了亚利桑那州坦佩的一家医院。

洛佩兹在重症监护室使用呼吸机数月后，于10月底出院。后来，她不得不与诺亚、她的两个大女儿和她的丈夫鲁道夫隔离开来。

“我们的生活被颠覆了，”鲁道夫·洛佩兹说。“我们有三个孩子。我4岁的孩子一直问，‘妈妈在哪里?“妈妈在哪里，”“这只是三个月的事。只是这种麻木的痛苦。"

鲁道夫·洛佩兹

瑞娜·洛佩兹在从新冠肺炎康复住院期间与她的女儿和丈夫合影。

像1100万被病毒感染的美国人中的许多人一样，雷纳·洛佩兹是一群即使在病毒离开身体后仍会经历持久症状的人之一，被称为“长途跋涉者”。

“我还在吸氧，”她说。“我尽量不要那么多。这样我可以让我的肺变得更强壮。但是我的口味完全变了。所以有很多食物我再也不吃了，它们曾经是我的最爱。”

尽管有症状，洛佩兹说，她现在正在慢慢好转，因为她和家人一起回来弥补失去的时间。

“我的孩子让我坚持下去。洛佩兹说:“我丈夫认为我在溺爱他们，但我只是在弥补。”。

据《英国医学杂志》报道，估计有10%被诊断为新冠肺炎的人会经历长期症状。这意味着超过100万美国人在从感染中康复后很长时间内可能会出现衰弱症状。

由幸存者军团提供

戴安娜·贝伦特说:“我在一个世界里与世隔绝，我来到了一个非常非常不同的世界。”。

这一令人担忧的现象促使美国各地开设了一系列后新冠肺炎护理中心。纽约市西奈山后COVID护理中心主任陈子健博士说，长途运输的症状会影响一个人的身体和认知。

“你有认知功能障碍的病人，你很难集中注意力，有非常严重的疲劳，也有身体状况非常不佳的病人，”陈说。

根据西奈山卫生系统，他们治疗的大多数长途运输者在20到40岁之间，他们通常是妇女，他们没有已知的潜在健康状况。

陈说，该中心是在5月份启动的，当时该市正从病毒病例的高峰期恢复过来。

“这些病人中的许多人住进了医院，他们知道(他们)需要某种形式的随访……我们想确保当他们回家时，他们有一个好的落脚点，我们继续他们的护理，”陈说。

她补充说，全国各地对疾病后护理的需求正在增加，其他州的医院已经开始开设自己的护理中心。

除了身体护理之外，新冠肺炎病患者通常还需要更多的信息和受疾病影响的其他人的支持网络。

戴安娜·贝伦特是两个孩子的母亲，也是新冠肺炎的幸存者，她创建了幸存者军团。新冠肺炎幸存者的全国性团体众包了关于病毒后生活的第一手知识。

由幸存者军团提供

来自纽约州长岛的新冠肺炎幸存者戴安娜·贝伦特和她的家人在这里。

伯伦特说，她是在亲身经历了病毒之后成立这个组织的。

“我在一个世界里被孤立了，我来到了一个非常非常不同的世界，”伯兰特说。“你有一种新型病毒，你没有任何信息……我开始有肠胃问题。我在网上什么也找不到。”

该组织的脸书页面现在有近12万名成员分享他们的经验、建议和支持。许多成员表示，他们仍在与长期症状作斗争，并报告感到焦虑或抑郁。

“有时候你只需要和理解你所经历的人谈谈。幸存者军团提供了这些，”伯兰特说。“作为一个集合，它激励着人们在需要的时候聚在一起，互相帮助，互相度过难关。”

该小组还帮助研究人员检查了长距离运输病毒种群的趋势，包括最近的一项调查印第安纳大学医学院的研究发现，疲劳是长途运输者报告的前50种症状中最常见的。

陈说，科学家们仍在努力寻找治疗这些病人的最佳方法。他说，防止长期影响的首要方法是首先保护自己免受病毒感染。

“听你的医生和卫生官员的，”他说。“戴上口罩，保持社交距离，因为防止自己出现长期症状的最好办法，其实就是首先防止自己出现COVID。”

Number of COVID-19 'long haulers,' survivors experiencing lasting virus symptoms, is growing

New mothers often experience many sleepless, tired nights taking care of their newborns. But for Reyna Lopez, the past five months have been a brutal nightmare -- she was diagnosed withCOVID-19just two months since giving birth.

"I had a fever. I had chills. I would get very dizzy and lightheaded when I would have any movement -- sitting down, standing up, just turning my head. I was getting nauseous. My body was hurting," said Reyna.

The 31-year-old tested positive for thecoronavirusin June. She was admitted to a hospital in Tempe, Arizona, just a few months after giving birth to her son, Noah.

Lopez was released from the hospital at the end of October after spending months in the intensive care unit on a ventilator. Afterward, she had to go into isolation from Noah, her two elder daughters and her husband, Rodolfo.

"Our life got flipped upside-down," Rodolfo Lopez said. "We have three kids. My 4-year-old kept asking, 'Where's mommy? Where's mommy?' "It's just three months of that. It's just this numbing pain."

Like many of the 11 million Americans who've been infected by the virus, Reyna Lopez is part of a group of people who experience lasting symptoms even after the virus has left the body, known as "long-haulers."

"I still am on oxygen," she said. "I try not to be as much. That way I can get my lungs stronger. But my taste has completely changed. So there's a lot of foods that I don't eat anymore that [once] were my favorite."

Despite her symptoms, Lopez said that she's slowly turning the corner now that she is back with her family making up for time lost.

"My kids keep me going. My husband thinks I'm spoiling them, but I'm just making up for it," said Lopez.

An estimated 10% of people diagnosed with COVID-19 go on to experience prolonged symptoms, according to the British Medical Journal. That translates into over a million Americans who could potentially experience debilitating symptoms long after they've recovered from the infection.

The alarming phenomenon has prompted a slew of post-COVID-19 care centers to open across the U.S. Dr. Zijian Chen, director of the Mount Sinai Center for Post-COVID Care in New York City, says long-hauler symptoms can affect a person physically and cognitively.

"You have patients with cognitive dysfunction, you have difficulty concentrating, having very bad fatigue, and also patients who are very [physically] deconditioned," said Chen.

According to the Mount Sinai Health System, the majority of long-haulers they've treated are between 20 and 40 years old, they're most often women and they have no known underlying health conditions.

Chen said the center was launched in May when the city was recovering from its apex of viral cases.

"Many of these patients admitted to the hospital, they knew [they needed] some sort of follow up… We wanted to make sure that when they went home that they had a good landing place and that we're continuing their care," said Chen.

She added that the demand for post-disease care is increasing across the country, and that that hospitals in other states have begun to open their own care centers.

Along with physical care, COVID-19 patients often are left wanting more information and a support network of others affected by the illness.

Diana Berrent, a New York mother of two and a COVID-19 survivor, founded Survivor Corps. The nationwide group of COVID-19 survivors crowdsources firsthand knowledge about life after the virus.

Berrent said she founded the group after her own personal experience with the virus.

"I went into isolation in one world and I came out to a very, very different world," said Berrent. "You have a novel virus, and you have no information whatsoever… I started having gastro[intestinal] issues. I couldn't find anything on the internet."

The group's Facebook page now has nearly 120,000 members who share their experiences, advice and support. Many of its members say they're still fighting long-term symptoms and report feeling anxious or depressed.

"Sometimes you just need to talk to somebody who understands what you're going through. And Survivor Corps offers that," said Berrent. "As a collection, it is inspiring just people coming together in a moment of need to help each other and help each other through."

The group has also helped researchers examine trends in the long-hauler virus population,including a recent surveyby Indiana University's School of Medicine, which found that fatigue is the most common of the top 50 symptoms reported by long-haulers.

Chen said that scientists are still trying to figure out the best way to care for these patients. He said that the number one way to prevent long-term effects is to protect yourself from getting the virus in the first place.

"Listen to your doctors and your health officials," he said. "Wear a mask and social distance, because the best way to prevent yourself from getting long-term symptoms is actually to prevent yourself from getting COVID in the first place."