Nicolas Candelaria Receives His COVID-19 Vaccine

His Parents Bob and Teresa Share What It’s Like For Someone with PMD to Get Vaccinated

High School Senior Nicolas Candelaria gets his first Moderna Vaccine on January 15

Part 1 - Nicolas has a history of choking and aspirating and a few visits, in his 22 years, to the hospital for pneumonia. We have avoided those visits for a few years now since Nicolas has been able to receive annual flu and pneumonia vaccines. We know that PMD is the direct culprit in these issues because it is the reason for his difficulty in swallowing, his inefficient cough, and his delayed gag reflex. So since the Covid-19 pandemic, we have been abundantly careful to limit his exposure. Luckily, we have kept the disease out of our home, although we have lost a few friends and neighbors to it. 

When vaccines became available, we signed up Nicolas at the same time as ourselves. Although we, his parents, both in our 50s, are still somewhere on the waiting list, Nicolas’s underlying medical conditions must have allowed him to cut the line and get the call to show up at 7:30 am on January 15 for the Moderna vaccine.

As PMD parents, we know that sometimes a wheelchair has its privilege. As we arrived to the UMC parking lot to see the socially-distanced lines snaking around the building, we worried how long we would have to wait in the cold. As it turns out, not very long. A uniformed officer saw Nicolas’s wheelchair and escorted us around the lines to the vaccination tent. 

Nicolas has always been very brave with shots and vaccines, never crying about the pain. In fact, he usually laughs. This time, he was too busy throwing kisses at the pretty nurse to laugh as she poked him with the needle. The protocol required us to stay for fifteen minutes to watch for adverse effects before we could leave. 

At home, we kept a close eye on Nicolas for several days. His school nurse recommended acetaminophen, but not ibuprofen, to stay ahead of any possible pain, and she recommended lots of movement of his arm to pre-empt soreness there too. Other than some rubbing of his head to indicate a headache or tiredness that night, Nicolas did fine: no fever, cough, nor any other symptoms. He was back to his usual talkative, laughing self by the next day.

Nicolas received his second vaccine just in time for St. Valentine’s Day. 

Part 2 - As we prepared for his booster on February 12, we read many stories about how the second shot was often more problematic for many. A few things were different for the second go-round. For one thing, shots were indoors at the County Coliseum, and we did not have to arrive as early. Again, we were called to the front row in the old concert venue to the “VIP section.” Nicolas threw fewer kisses, and he actually shuddered a bit when he was poked. Again we waited the fifteen minutes, this time indoors before we returned home. 

Even though we maintained our same routine of acetaminophen and exercise, this time, Nicolas did react to the second shot with a slight fever of 99 for a day. Luckily, however, by Valentine’s day, he was again fine and ready to be his rambunctious self.

Although Nicolas is now vaccinated, we still remain careful about possible exposure until we learn more about long-term effects and until we can be vaccinated ourselves. One difficult aspect of this pandemic for Nicolas is that he is experiencing his final year of high school remotely: no football games, no pep rallies, no parties. But now that he has been vaccinated, we hope that other things return to normal enough so that he can participate in his graduation with his class in June.