Father In Tears Thanks 'Angels For My Family'

RESTON, VA — It's been a difficult two months for Joshua "Josh" Funk and his family.

The problems began when Funk's wife Evelin called him at the Four Winds of Oakton condominiums, where he works as a maintenance man. She was at home caring for their four children, the two youngest being 7-month-old twins, when she asked him to come home.

"My wife, in May, she started feeling sick," Funk said. "She just couldn't understand what was going on. By May 7, she said, 'I can't stand it no more.'"

It was before lunch and Funk called his boss to tell him that he needed to go home to take care of his family.

"I came home and started helping out, then my daughter started developing symptoms, a high fever, and she was complaining about her throat," he said. "My wife had the same thing, she was complaining about her throat."

After several days of being sick, Evelin and her daughter Gladys realized they couldn't smell anything, which is one of the symptoms of COVID-19, the illness associated with the new coronavirus.

Evelin tested positive for the virus and Gladys was given an antibiotic to treat strep throat. Funk's other son, Josh Jr., also was treated for strep throat, and the pediatrician prescribed ibuprofen for the high fever the twins were experiencing due to teething.

Funk's wife was already recovering from COVID-19 when he tested positive for the disease. On May 12, he was experiencing chest compressions, which were extremely painful.

As an adult living with asthma, Funk has had a lifetime of health issues, including a six-day stay at Reston Hospital caused by a viral infection, which he said nearly killed him. Rather than going through another long hospital stay, he chose to recover at home.

"I took a chance," he said. "I told God, 'I believe in medicine, but I couldn't believe in me staying here and have them put me on a respirator, because I don't feel that bad.'"

When Funk got home, he followed the CDC guidelines, isolated himself in his room, took the four days of medicine the hospital had given him for his pneumonia, as well as Tylenol, Motrin, and natural herbs and remedies.

While the CDC cleared Funk to return to his job on May 26, the maintenance company he works for requires that he first had to have two confirmed COVID-19-free tests before he could work again. The earliest he could return was July 15.

In the meantime, Funk had burned through all his sick leave and vacation days, leaving the family with only a few hundred dollars in savings.

Funk likes helping other people and is always looking for opportunities to offer his services as a handyman. However, he's found it difficult to get an other job once people learned that he had been sick.

"I get the feeling that people are afraid of me now, like a leper or something," he said. "With this sickness, I get this feeling that people rejected me."

But not all people had rejected Funk and his family.

Michael Brunelle is a former Four Winds resident, who now lives in Boston. He became friends with the Funk family back in 2009 when he first moved to Oakton.

As a board member of Four Winds, Brunelle knew about Funk's situation. He and group of other people from the Four Winds decided they wanted to help the family out.

"We were doing small stuff, giving him a couple of hundred dollars a month, doing grocery runs for him, sending him care packages, sending him diapers, but that wasn't enough," Brunelle said. "We have to bring this to the next level because he couldn't pay for rent, he couldn't pay for food anymore. So that's when the GoFundMe idea came about."

Brunelle and David Marsh launched a GoFundMe page to help the Funk family out their tough financial straights. With the help of 73 donors, the campaign achieved its goal of raising $5,000 in less than three days.

"I was in shock when they made the GoFundMe," Funk said. "And when I opened it, there was already $500 in there. When I showed that to my wife, she burst into tears and couldn't believe it."

Funk called Brunelle his guardian angel and was overcome by the generosity of the donors, many of whom were friends and teachers at Terraset Elementary School, where Gladys Funk is a student.

"I am so grateful for everybody that became angels for my family," Funk said, overcome with tears.

Brunelle is also grateful with the community's response to the GoFundme campaign.

"The thing with Josh is, they're one of the hardest working families I know," he said. "And they're one of the families that'll give you their shirts of their back. That's how they are. They sacrifice and work hard, just full of love and compassion. I'm just glad it came around to give them some support."

Do YOU have a local hero you would like us to know about? Share their story here.

All photos included in this post are owned by identified third parties who have given Patch the right to use explicitly for the Patch Local Heroes series.

Also see ...

Reston's Heroes: Help Patch Recognize Those Making A Difference

RCC Staff Goes Above And Beyond During Coronavirus: Reston Heroes