COVID-19 Patient Recovers Slowly And Painfully: 'Shortness Of Breath Has Never Left'

CHICAGO (CBS) --  As thousands in Illinois are diagnosed with COVID-19, the road to recovery may be a long one for some, no matter the age.

CBS 2's Jim Williams has the story of one young woman's fight to get her health back to normal.

"So I'm just overall an active person."

Active is an understatement. Amy Fabrizius is 27 years old, a devoted athlete: rock climbing, long bike rides, long runs and often with her boyfriend Zac who owns a gym west of Elgin where Amy leads personal training sessions.

"We're always outside. We're always doing something," Fabrizius said.

On March 20, she had a dry cough. The next day, chest congestion. She thought exercise might do some good.

"We went for a two mile bike ride and I hyperventilated and I couldn't breathe," Fabrizius said.

She tested positive for COVID-19 and was terrified.

"Because I had a pandemic virus that was killing people," she lamented.

Amy, who is 27, was never hospitalized, never on a ventilator. But doctors said her lungs are scarred. And seven weeks after that first dry cough, she's far from 100%.

"The shortness of breath came and has never left," Fabrizius said.

Doctor Michelle Prickett, a pulmonary and critical care doctor at Northwestern Memorial Hospital, said full lung recovery after COVID-19 can take months or years or longer.

"The lung is an organ just like your skin. So whenever there's an injury there's going be a time of healing, and until things are completely healed it's hard to know what the end result of injury will be," Prickett said.

Don't be misled by the large numbers of people recovering from COVID-19, Fabrizius said. For many, like her, physical struggles continue, leading her boyfriend, Zac, to offer this:

"Zac told me I'd rather keep my gym closed for six more months than open it and potentially expose someone to else to have the same end result as you."