Colorado Springs COVID-19 survivor gives timeline of her symptoms and recovery

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (KRDO) -- Of the more than 450 cases of COVID-19 in El Paso County, Cara Johnson is one of the people who has successfully fought off the virus.

She was diagnosed with the novel coronavirus in March and says her symptoms appeared overnight.

"I felt fine on the Saturday before I started getting sick. I had no symptoms and then I woke up that Sunday morning feeling pretty sick," Johnson explained.

On Sunday March 15th, she says her symptoms progressed and worsened throughout the day.

"As the day went on, my fever kept going up. I started coughing, definitely that tightness in the chest, and I noticed my throat was starting to get sore."

Through March 16th, 17th and 18th, days after her she felt her first symptoms, Johnson says she spent a lot of time resting.

"Those three days are a lot of me sleeping, having a high temperature, really don't remember too much of those because I was in and out of sleep."

Johnson explains, "I was feeling very warm due to the fever but I was also cold at the same time. Had some body aches but that wasn't too bad for me."

Initially, she reached out to her primary care doctor but couldn't get an appointment to be tested. Instead, Johnson opted to go directly through her medical insurance, which sent her to a drive-up testing facility in Lone Tree on March 17th.

"I stayed in my car. They did my vitals through my car. They did the nose swab test with me. I was probably in and out of there in ten minutes."

Her preliminary results came back for COVID-19 the next day with a presumptive positive result.

"By the 19th, I started having no fever. I was coughing less."

About a week later, the Center for Disease Control called her directly to tell her she officially had coronavirus.

"Getting the notice that, yes you are positive, was a relief of some sort," she said. "'Okay that is why I was so sick,' but at the same time it was that feeling of, 'I hope didn't get anyone else sick when I didn't realize I had symptoms.'"

On March 20th and 21st is when she finally started to feel better, although one symptom has persisted weeks after she recovered.

"I really can't smell or taste much of anything. That's slowly starting to come back. I had an appetite but I couldn't taste anything."

Johnson and her roommate got the virus at the same time, but neither knows where they contracted it or who passed it to the other. She explains both were already isolating themselves and working from home, and only leaving the house for essential trips.