After months of trauma, vaccinated health-care workers welcome a surprising emotion: hope - Washington Post

For weeks, the long-term care facility where Linda Green works as a nurse looked to her like a battlefield hospital, swathed in plastic drapes separating the ill from the uninfected.

The coronavirus ripped through the western Maryland facility like wildfire at the end of 2020, deepening Green’s fear that she, at 73, might bring the virus home to her husband, who is 84.

Then she received a coronavirus shot.

It felt like any other vaccination, leaving her with mild upper arm soreness but no other physical side effects.

Even thinking of the vaccine, Green said two weeks after receiving the Moderna shot, makes her practically “cry with relief” as she pictures a brighter future for herself and those she cares for.

“Now, when I go in and I’m putting on my N95, I think, ‘This may only be for a few more weeks,’ ” said Green, though she expects even after that to continue wearing a surgical mask around residents, who have also been vaccinated.

Although about 21 million health-care personnel are in the first group to be inoculated, many have not yet received the vaccine, and some remain hesitant.

“Sometimes, I feel like I walk around with a biohazard sign on me,” said Danielle Gonzalez, 39, an intensive care unit nurse in Eugene, Ore.

After one dose of vaccine, she said, she already feels like a small load has been lifted.

The vaccine, Gonzalez said, feels like an unseen additional layer of PPE — one that makes the prospect of once again hugging her parents, both of whom are over 65, feel more real.

Before the coronavirus hit, Tucker, 45, rarely wore any sort of mask.

“It feels like kind of a war type of situation,” Tucker said.

“I feel totally more optimistic, feeling more like it’s not this personal threat,” Tucker said.

“I feel like, if things became really bad again, I would be happy to volunteer to help.

“I’m scheduled for my second dose, and I’m like, ‘Oh man, it’s going to feel so good,’ ” Brock said.

But Hazera, who felt a year ago like she was winding down her career, is staying on the job.

Green, the long-term care nurse, is focusing for now on those in her world who have received the vaccine — not just herself, but the residents of the facility where she works.

Green said she felt deeply sad that despite precautions, the virus made its way to a population that had been so cut off from the outside.