After 61-year-old Patricia Frieson died Monday, just days after testing positive for the coronavirus, her family is remembering her as a woman who took her relationships, and her faith, seriously.
Tarah Frieson, Patricia’s nephew, says he will never forget his aunt’s voice, especially when she would sing worship songs.
“She loved to sing,” he said. “She was just a good person all the way around. There was nothing you could really say bad about her. A lot of people loved her.”
Patricia Frieson died Monday after testing positive for COVID-19. Her brother Anthony says his sister ended up in the hospital last week after complaining of respiratory issues, which were connected to a pre-existing medical condition.
“She was having trouble breathing,” Anthony said. “We were not thinking along the lines of coronavirus at the time. We were not thinking of it as something that she might have.”
A test over the weekend at a local hospital revealed that Frieson had the virus.
“She was initially in with an oxygen mask to increase her oxygen levels. They tried another oxygen mask too, but it was getting progressively worse,” her brother said.
Doctors were eventually forced to put her on a ventilator, but on Monday the retired nurse passed away.
Anthony Frieson is now under self-quarantine after another friend tested positive for the virus.
“One of my friends had gone in with symptoms and was diagnosed with the virus after a couple of days, and the Chicago Department of Public Health contacted me and requested that I self-quarantine,” he said.
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Anthony says that his sister spent a majority of her life in the south, moving to the South Side of Chicago approximately 20 years ago.
Now he wants people to learn from his sister’s death, emphasizing just how scary and life-threatening the disease can be for vulnerable populations.
“It’s very real. It’s spreading,” he said. “We don’t have a full grasp of it. We are just dealing with the reality of what it brought us.”
