A healthy frontline worker who took the COVID vaccine early in the pandemic went viral after she shared her story of debilitating injury.
QUICK FACTS:
- Madaline Johnson received the Pfizer vaccine in February 2021, volunteering due to her work in California hospitals, according to her website, Speak Your Truth.
- Following the vaccine, her symptoms began with headaches and fatigue, increasing in severity following her second dose near the end of the month.
- Within 10 hours, Johnson had a fever, raging headaches, and began to have joint pain in her hands and arms.
- The pain and numbness traveled up to her shoulder as she lost muscle strength and motor skills in her right arm, also experiencing tremors in her fingers by April of that year.
- Johnson later lost control of her right foot and eventually lost all feeling in the right side of her body before being diagnosed with a vaccine-related injury.
- The formerly healthy California resident has since received treatment and is seeing significant gains, according to a recent social media post. However, she is still susceptible to sporadic temporary paralysis of her right side.
MADALINE’S STORY:
- “My life felt like it was flipped upside down as a 21 year old following my covid-19 Pfizer vaccine. Although I had close family and some friends that I told about the situation send me love and support the entire way, I still felt so incredibly alone,” Madaline said on her blog. “Between the countless doctor appointments, er visits, [sic] sleeping in waiting rooms, perfect labs, and shoulder shrugs from doctors, I felt hopeless. After deciding to finally be vulnerable and share my story with my mom on instagram, I quickly found that I was not alone.
- “I wanted to make a safe zone for those that are suffering from the same injuries as I, and many others around the world. While it seriously breaks my heart, I also found relief in knowing I wasn’t alone and if anything, it empowered me even more to find the help I needed. Here you can share your story and see that you are not alone. Speak YOUR truth about YOUR health and vaccine injury. We hear you, we support you, and we want to find you help!
- “I hope that one day with enough voices being heard, we can advocate further for more informed consent of the side effects of vaccines. We should be informed of WHAT is going into our body, HOW it works, and WHAT the possible side effects are. At the end of the day, we ultimately make the decision for our health, but that should be done with the proper information + our best interests considered. Maybe we can be the spark to improve the vaccine formula to diminish these side effects and better the efficacy to save even more lives.”
BACKGROUND:
- Johnson’s story went viral on social media, prompting her to create her website, Speak Your Truth.
- She was pursuing a career in medicine and working in a hospital when her vaccine injury put an end to most of her activities.
- To donate to Johnson’s recovery fund, you can visit her GoFundMe page.
