Fitness trainer Amanda Kloots, whose husband, Broadway star Nick Cordero, died Sunday following a three-month battle with complications from COVID-19, credited her Instagram followers on Monday with making Cordero's ultimate career dream come true.
In an Instagram Live, Kloots tearfully thanked fans for their support during her husband's 95-day hospitalization, and said that although she wasn't sure "what Nick could see or understand," she always told him about the love being sent his way.
Every day at 3 p.m. PT, Kloots' 492,000 followers were encouraged to sign on to social media to sing Cordero's song "Live Your Life," with the hope that the actor would feel encouragement from afar.
That tradition "always made me feel better," Kloots said, adding that more importantly, it made Cordero into the famous rock star he always dreamed of becoming.
"We played this song a lot yesterday in Nick's room with him and we were singing to him and I kept telling him that he had the whole world singing his song and knowing who he was and what kind of an amazing person he was," she said. "I just wanted him to know that his dream of becoming a rock star happened. And sometimes your dreams happen and you don't get to fully embrace them, but Nick's dream of becoming a rock star definitely happened and it was because of you guys."
Cordero, 41, went to the emergency room on March 30 for what he believed was pneumonia, but later tested positive for COVID-19, the respiratory illness caused by the novel coronavirus. He was put on a ventilator within a matter of days.
"He didn't have a fever. He didn't have a cough. He had a sense of smell, he had a sense of taste, so we really didn't think it was COVID, especially [with] his no preexisting conditions," Kloots told "Good Morning America" in May.
Throughout his three-month stay in the intensive care unit of Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, Cordero suffered a number of setbacks, including several lung infections and a clotting issue that resulted in a leg amputation. However, Kloots remained endlessly positive about her husband's prognosis, saying on Instagram in late May that he "has literally defied odds, and I think there's something to that."
"You don't go through all of this to not make it through all of this," she added. "I think about how tired and exhausted he must be, and it helps me to be like, 'OK, if he can do it, I can do this.' I can keep fighting. I can keep hoping. I can keep cheering him on. I can keep singing."
In an Instagram post on Monday, Kloots shared a nearly 11-minute-long video made by her sister that documents how their family came together during Cordero's hospital stay. The video, entitled "The Silver Linings," captures "the love, the exhaustion, the bonds, the smiles, the song, the exercise, the hard work, the care, support, and most of all, love," Kloots explained.
In addition to coping with her husband's diagnosis and treatment, Kloots has been simultaneously running a business and caring for her and Cordero's 1-year-old son, Elvis.
"I have always been lucky to have a family that loves to be together and to support each other. I’m even luckier to have Nick's family and extended family that are the same," she wrote. "They did all of this for Nick, Elvis and I -- selfless time from their lives to be with us. In times of trauma, look for the silver linings. Spend time with family. Smile through the tears. Have faith when things seem impossible. Love one another."