BEREA, Ky. (LEX 18) — On March 6, 2020, Governor Andy Beshear announced the first confirmed case of the coronavirus in Kentucky.
Since then, COVID-19 has contributed to the deaths of more than 19,650 Kentuckians, according to state officials.
Sports journalist Keith Taylor remembers the NCAA basketball tournament getting canceled in March of 2020, the first sign of all to come.
“I think everyone was just kind of caught by surprise of how serious a virus can shut down society,” said Taylor, publisher of the Berea Citizen and sports editor for Kentucky Today.
In the beginning, the pandemic merely disrupted Taylor’s sports coverage, but not long after, it would shatter his whole world.
“In late August, early September, my mom got sick, and we thought something was more serious than just a cough or cold, so she went to the hospital, and they gave her a chest x-ray before she came home, and then all the sudden a day and a half after she came home, she was back in the ER,” said Taylor.
Taylor’s mom, Donna Reed, spent weeks on a ventilator, unable to see her family as hospitals across the country restricted visitors.
“It was heartbreaking knowing she was alone, by herself, nobody there,” said Taylor.
Eventually, doctors said there was nothing they could do and allowed the family to don PPE and say their goodbyes.
“I walked in, said, ‘Mom, I love you,' and I walked out,” said Taylor. "I wasn’t there when she took her last breath. I didn't want to be. People handle it in different ways, so I went to the waiting room and just…just cried."
Donna passed away on October 5, 2020. As publisher of the Berea Citizen, Taylor had to write his mom’s obituary for the newspaper. After 25 years on the job, that was his toughest assignment yet.
This week, as memorials remind Kentuckians of the pandemic’s arrival four years ago, Taylor doesn’t believe it’s gotten easier. He says he’s just able to accept it more.
He remembers how his mom lived, and not how she died.
“I can remember going into a restaurant and we'd be eating and we'd go, 'Where's mom?' She's over there talking to somebody,” laughed Taylor. “She never met a stranger. She was kind, giving, loving.”
