Woman, 49, who lay next to her dying mother in intensive care as they both battled Covid tells GMB the 76-year-old asked for her mask to be removed so she could tell her daughters she loved them in her final moments
- Anabel Sharma, 49, taken to hospital with Covid along with mother Maria, 76
- Took photograph together in hospital beds as they lay in intensive care
- Maria died 24 hours after the picture was taken at Leicester Royal Infirmary
- Mother-of-three Anabel told how she held mother’s hand as she passed away
A woman who lay next to her mother in intensive care as she died from Covid has told how the 76-year-old asked for her mask to be removed so she could tell her daughters she loved them one final time.
Mother-of-three Anabel Sharma, 49, from Leicestershire, shared a heartbreaking final picture of her holding hands with her mother Maria Rico, 76, in a Covid ward at Leicester Royal Infirmary after Maria had signed a Do Not Attempt Resuscitation (DNAR) order and declared her funeral wishes. Maria tragically died the next day.
Appearing on Good Morning Britain today, Anabel told presenters Piers Morgan and Susanna Reid that her mother said everything you’d want to hear a parent say before she passed away.
‘I was really fortunate,’ she explained. ‘After that photograph was taken my mum had to be taken back to her bed because they’d removed her from her monitors to come and speak to me. Because I was do distressed I was sedated again.
‘It felt like only five minutes had passed and the consultant was there again by my bed. It had actually been a day and they told me my mum was dying and they were going to arrange for my bed to be taken to where my mum was.
Anabel Sharma, 49, from Leicestershire, shared a heartbreaking final picture of her holding hands with her mother Maria Rico, 76, in a Covid ward at Leicester Royal Infirmary
Anabel (pictured) told how Maria said to her: ‘She loved us, was proud of us and that I had to keep fighting to get home to my children’
‘My sister was allowed to be on the ward in full PPE. When they took us to mum, she asked them to remove her mask and they said to her, “as soon as we do this you’re not going to have very long.” She just nodded. We did have five minutes with her.
She said everything you’d want your mother to say. She said she loved us, was proud of us and that I had to keep fighting to get home to my children. Equally we told her, held her hands, as she sort of fell unconscious. We held her hands until she passed away.’
Anabel when on to say that when the photograph was actually taken, she’d just been told her probably only had two days left to live. They brought her mother’s over to hers so she could tell Anabel that herself.
Now, Anabel has warned others they can lose family members if they don’t stick to the rules.
Anabel has warned others they can lose family members if they don’t stick to the rules. Pictured, speaking to presenters Piers Morgan and Susanna Reid
‘My message certainly would be that for me, I genuinely thought if I was to catch the virus it wouldn’t affect me as much as it did,’ she said. ‘Even when the ambulances arrived to take us to hospital and I was wheeled up to intensive care, I remember asking the doctors if I was going to die.’
‘I genuinely expected them to say no…his answer was that he didn’t know whether I was going to die or not. That for me was the moment I thought everything was over.’
She continued: ‘I’m not that old. I have very mild asthma. It’s really important to do what you can. You can only control your own environment, but if we could did that safely, perhaps it would be a different picture today.
Susanna Reid went on to explain how Anabel has contracted Covid back in October.
‘I’ve been reading you were kickboxing six hours a week, doing more than most people in terms of exercise and fitness and yet here you are at the beginning of the New Year still receiving treatment,’ she added.
Anabel replied: ‘I have oxygen and at the moment it’s unknown how long I’ll need the oxygen for. Certainly the Covid has given me permanent lung damage.
‘It’s killed a part of my left lung and the base of my left and right lung and whether I’ll actually be able to get back to the level of fitness i had before Covid is unknown at the moment. They just don’t have enough data on the long term affects of Covid.’