Georgia airline pilot shares story of 2-month battle with COVID-19

A 49-year-old Southwest Airlines pilot is finally going home after a two-month battle with COVID-19 in a Georgia hospital.

"At Newnan Piedmont Hospital they told me that I was the youngest person they had who was so sick," Chris Sickel told FOX 5.

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Sickel had no underlying conditions and was a healthy man until just before Thanksgiving he became sick. He worsened at the beginning of December.

At the time he had tested negative for the virus and was on antibiotics.

A home nurse, during a visit, told him to go to the hospital.

He recalled: "She said my lips were blue and my fingernails were blue. Call 911."

He tested positive at the hospital, and his condition quickly deteriorated.

Sickel volunteered to be placed on a ventilator, and he was sedated and paralyzed for four weeks.

During two months of medical care, Sickel was in the hospital, then a facility to wean him off the ventilator, and finally a rehab center to help him regain limb strength.

While he still will have to go through weekly outpatient rehab, Sickel is ready to go back to normal: swimming, hiking, outdoor activities and getting back in the cockpit.

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His first celebration was last Friday when before going home he rang the bell at Encompass Health Rehabilitation Hospital after a 10-day stay.

"It felt great," he said.  "A real accomplishment."