Pop star P!nk just went through one of the most ‘terrifying’ experiences of her life, and it could happen to any of us.
She and her 3-year-old son Jameson recently contracted COVID-19, an ordeal that the “Try” singer discussed on Thursday’s (April 9) episode of The Ellen DeGeneres Show via video chat. Her raw and honest account of the situation certainly makes the need to remain home during these difficult times more important than ever.
“It started with Jameson, actually, and, you know, he’s three. Three-year-olds get sick all the time but he started with a fever March 14, we’ve been quarantined since March 11,” P!nk told Ellen. “It started with a fever for him and it would come and go and he would have stomach pains and diarrhea and chest pains and then a headache, sore throat,” she continued, explaining how the illness progressed.
“It sort of was just all over the place. Every day was just some new symptom. His fever stayed, it didn’t go. And then it just started going up and up and up and up and then at one point it was at 103. I’m calling my doctor, ‘What do I do?’ He’s like, ‘There’s nothing to do. He’s 3. We’re not seeing this take 3-year-olds out, so just stay home.'”
It was a harrowing experience for the whole family, and one P!nk has called “terrifying,” especially as she started seeing her own symptoms cropping up after they got to her son.
“I woke up in the middle of the night and couldn’t breathe and I needed to get to a nebulizer for the first time in 30 years,” she said of the beginning of her own illness. “I have this inhaler that I use, this rescue inhaler, and I couldn’t function without it, and that’s when I started to get really scared.”
Eventually, she was able to get a single test to determine whether or not she or her son had coronavirus. She opted to take it herself, and it came back positive, something she “already knew” would happen.
“I thought they told us our kids were going to be OK,” she continued during a tearful confession. “We were told our kids were going to be OK. I think when people started explaining what this disease is, it was too early to be able to name it completely and tell everybody what to look for.” Fortunately, husband Carey Hart and 8-year-old Willow seemed unaffected.
But even though P!nk and her son are finally on the mend, she’s still facing backlash from people who were upset with her for being able to get tested, when so many cannot.
I would say you should be angry that I can get a test and you can’t. But being angry at me is not going to help anything,” she notes. “It’s not going to solve the issue of the fact that you can’t get your hands on a test. You should be angry about that. And we should work together to try and change that. And number two, tell me anybody with a sick 3-year-old that if they could get their hands on a test wouldn’t take it and if they say that, I’m all calling bullshit.”
