Lancaster mom still on ventilator battling COVID-19 after emergency c-section delivery

COLUMBIA, S.C. (WIS) - A Lancaster Mom of three is in the fight of her life against COVID-19.

It all started with her kids’ complaints of a headache after a summer sports camp. Cierra Nicole Abbington-Chubb’s seven-year-old daughter complained of headaches, stomach aches, and a fever in mid-July.

Then, her 2 1/2-year-old son started showing similar symptoms. But after 48 hours, both kids’ symptoms went away. That’s when Cierra’s symptoms began.

“Cierra had developed sniffles,” said her husband, Jamal Chubb. “She thought it was just a cold.”

By July 21st, Chubb told his wife he thought she should go get a COVID-19 test. She was 37 weeks pregnant with their third child.

The test came back positive.

Cierra was unvaccinated, waiting for guidance to come out from respected OBGYN groups and the CDC recommending the vaccine for pregnant women. That guidance came too late for Cierra, who had already contracted coronavirus roughly a week before the first big endorsements went public.

By the day of her 33rd birthday, July 24th, Cierra was struggling to breathe and was transferred from Lancaster to Columbia and admitted to Prisma Health Richland with COVID pneumonia. Doctors told her there was a lot of stress on the little life inside her and he needed to come out right away.

Myles came into the world by emergency c-section on July 26th, but he went home without Cierra. Jamal said it’s the first time in their 12 years of marriage that he’s gone home without Cierra in the backseat with their new baby. Within two days of that delivery, Cierra was having more difficulty having conversations with him from her hospital room over Facetime.

There’s one Facetime he will never forget.

“I’m talking and I’m saying ‘save your breath babe, we need you to fight,’ and she pans the camera over to the doctors and they’re putting her on a ventilator,” Jamal said. That was my last conversation with Cierra until yesterday.”

It’s been more than two weeks since Cierra went on the ventilator. She’s also on an ECMO machine, helping oxygenate her blood and allowing her organs to heal.

The waiting – for her husband – is insufferable.

“I feel lost, I feel confused, I feel angry…I feel …the way I feel right now is like I’m running a relay race and every time I’m passing the baton I’m passing it to myself,” Jamal said.

On Facebook and Tik Tok, Jamal updates people daily. He asks for prayers and updates everyone on Cierra’s condition. He continues to hope that her fighting spirit pulls her through this ordeal.

As she continues to fight for her life in an ICU bed, he continues to tell her:

“I love you, I believe in you…keep fighting, you’re important, you matter…”

Jamal continues to remind people to take the virus seriously because while the fatality rate may be a small percentage compared to the number of people infected. He says the people who get sick are 100% of someone’s world.

Copyright 2021 WIS. All rights reserved.

Notice a spelling or grammar error in this article? Click or tap here to report it. Please include the article’s headline.