‘It’s helped me.’ Video about KY man’s coronavirus death brings support for his son.
When Dustin Pitman’s father was dying from COVID-19, Pitman didn’t expect his emotional Facebook post about ending life support for him to reach thousands of people.
But he’s glad it did.
Pitman, of Pulaski County, has received an outpouring of supportive messages, and people have told him the video reinforced the vital importance of staying home whenever possible during the novel coronavirus pandemic, and staying clear of people while in public.
“It’s helped me along through this tough process,” Pitman said of the response.
Pitman’s father, David Pitman, 62, died early April 2 at Lake Cumberland Regional Hospital in Somerset. He was the first known death in the county from COVID-19.
David Pitman started feeling ill on March 20 and went to the doctor on March 23.
Within days he was critically ill with pneumonia in both lungs. By April 1 his organs were failing and doctors gave him little chance of survival, his son said.
The family made the wrenching decision to withdraw life support. That’s what his father would have wanted, Dustin Pitman said.
Wearing full protective gear, Pitman and his brother got to see their father at the hospital, but their mother, Star, was in quarantine.
Pitman called other family members from the hospital room so they could say goodbye.
“I told him that I didn’t want to do anything but make him proud,” Pitman said. “I think the last thing I told him was I love you.”
Pitman, who is 27, left the hospital and went on Facebook in the parking lot as hospital staff disconnected his father, urging people to take the coronavirus seriously.
“I love everybody, and stay at home,” he said.
His father died about 45 minutes later.
The video has been viewed more than 30,000 times on Pitman’s Facebook page and shared widely.
One woman told the Herald-Leader that seeing the video reinforced her decision to stay away from a workplace where she worried she was being exposed to the virus.
“That really made my day right there,” Pitman said on hearing of that contact. “That’s all I wanted, if it could help somebody.”
Pitman said his father milked cows before school as a young man and served in the U.S. Army. He worked at factories in Somerset after returning to Kentucky and at a state-run facility for people with mental handicaps. He was working at the city water plant last year when he was forced to retire because of colon cancer.
Pitman thinks his father’s bout with cancer and his diabetes made him more susceptible to severe complications from the coronavirus.
He said it’s not clear how David Pitman was exposed to the virus. A woman at the church he attended also tested positive, but his father was not at a service with her, so it doesn’t appear she was the source of his exposure, Dustin Pitman said.
No one else in their family has gotten sick from the virus.
Pitman said faith and family were important to his father. He had four children and doted on his nine grandchildren.
Pitman, who drives a truck, was at his father’s house with his two daughters when David Pitman started to feel ill.
The girls wanted a hug from their grandfather, but he told them no from across the house because he didn’t want to risk making them sick.
“He hollered and said ‘Papaw loves you girls,’ “ Dustin Pitman said.
David Pitman liked to fish and garden, had a small dog named Mushu that was so important to him that Pitman’s family mentioned the dog in his obituary, and loved to joke and play pranks.
Pitman said once when he and his brother were playing music in a outbuilding, the police went to a house next door. His father banged on the building and told them the police were there for them.
“If he wasn’t joking around with you, you knew something was wrong,” Pitman said.
His father would have liked the fact that Dustin Pitman’s video about his death helped people, Pitman said.
“I think it would’ve made Dad proud,” he said. “With Dad passing, I think the outcome of it all has been a positive influence on people.”
This story was originally published April 8, 2020 at 10:18 AM.
