[00:00:00]

Ches Crosbie

Our next witness is Josephine Fillier, who will be appearing virtually. Josephine, do you affirm that you will tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?

Josephine Fillier

I do.

Ches Crosbie

Thank you.

Criss Hochhold

Hello, Josephine.

Okay, can you please tell us your full name, where you live, and what do you do?

Josephine Fillier

My name is Josephine Fillier, and I am from St. John’s, Newfoundland. I am a stay-at-home mother to three children.

Criss Hochhold

In your submission to National Citizens Inquiry, you advised us that you received the vaccine in 2021, is that correct?

Josephine Fillier

Yes, June 18.

Criss Hochhold

What prompted you to get vaccinated?

Josephine Fillier

Well, basically at the beginning of COVID, everything was locked down. And I was doing my high school diploma, trying to get it after 13 years of being a stay-at-home mom. And I had to quit because the kids went online and I had to help them with their online studies and I couldn’t focus in my house, doing my work. So I became like depressed, isolated, and all these things.

So when the injections came out to get, the Atlantic bubble was closed, and my partner was in Niagara Falls, and it would be my first trip off the island, so I decided to leave. He paid for the trip, and I went to Niagara Falls. But to get it, I had to get the COVID injection into my body because I was in fear that the government would come to my house. And there was all kinds of fear—online, in the news and everything—at the time.

Criss Hochhold

So Josephine, it sounds like you were quite apprehensive about getting the vaccination, is that true?

Josephine Fillier

Yeah, I had severe anxiety attacks. Like, I’ve been struggling with depression and anxiety since I was a little girl, but it was very manageable. I was on antidepressants and anxiety meds and they helped me out a lot. But my intuition, I guess, told me not to get this COVID injection. I knew something was off about it anyways. But since I was in fear and I really wanted to go visit my partner, who was in a different province, and I didn’t want to isolate away from my children for two weeks upon arriving home, I ended up getting it. And I knew it was the biggest mistake of my life.

Criss Hochhold

Josephine, where did you go get the vaccination?

Josephine Fillier

At the Village Mall, here in St. John’s.

Criss Hochhold

Do you remember who administered it to you?

Josephine Fillier

It was an LPN—Faye Chidley.

Criss Hochhold

Before administering the vaccine, did the LPN explain the potential risks and/or benefits of the vaccination for COVID-19?

Josephine Fillier

No, basically all they said was that I would have a fever and a sore arm. And they told me to stay for about 15 minutes just to make sure I didn’t have a reaction. So I took my paper that had my lot number and the stuff to do in case you have, like, a fever or sore arm or anything like that and I just sat down. And then I was fine after 15 minutes, so I went home; I took the bus and I went home.

Criss Hochhold

Prior to the vaccine, did you have any health issues? Were you an active person? Were you eating healthy? Can you describe your lifestyle a bit to us and how that’s changed since then?

Josephine Fillier

Well, before, I was a very outgoing active person; I wasn’t in fear of anything. I was like, you know, a bubbly type person. And I have ADHD, so I’m always active; like, I wake up in the morning and I can go, go, go all day long. It runs in the family, so my mom is like it, my sister is like it. So ever since then, I’ve had to basically slow down a lot. Because if I exert myself much, I feel like my body is shutting down.

Criss Hochhold

Okay. Just for the Commission’s records, the vaccine itself was Pfizer.

Josephine Fillier

Yeah, I had one dose.

Criss Hochhold

One dose. Do you have the lot number on you, Josephine?

[00:05:00]

Josephine Fillier

Yeah, I keep checking it, to see if there’s any adverse side effects. So it’s FA 9093.

Criss Hochhold

Josephine, what happened after you received the vaccine? Just refresh my memory with that because you said you went home, you were fine at first.

Josephine Fillier

Yeah, well, I was fine. It takes me about 45 minutes to an hour to get the bus from the mall to my house. And prior to the vaccine, I had a bruise in my right thigh and it never healed fully. So when I went home, I was laying down on the couch and I noticed that there was a severe burning pain in my leg. And I thought that something was seriously wrong. That I was clotting maybe, maybe something was going on with my leg. And so, I put my feet up on the back of the couch just in case, to elevate my feet. And it just escalated from there.

Criss Hochhold

How do you mean escalated?

Josephine Fillier

Basically, the burning never went away; even 20 months later, it’s still there. It escalated to crawling sensations, like, I had bumps on my legs, which are still there today. I had swelling and internal vibrations, and then I had lumps all over my legs, on the back of my thighs and on my shins.

Criss Hochhold

Josephine, with all the symptoms that you’re showing, did you report those to a health care professional—to your doctor—or did you go to the hospital?

Josephine Fillier

No, I actually went to my doctor. He’s been my doctor for 23 years now. He knows my entire medical history, my mom, my sister, all of our kids. And he gaslit me the entire time.

I was telling him about the lumps on my legs and he just told me to get compression socks. I told him about lumps in my scalp, in my head, that were very painful. And this remark was really, really upsetting because he told me that if I didn’t look for lumps, I wouldn’t find any. And I thought that, you know, if you check lumps—you have to check your body, you have to be self-aware. You have to understand your symptoms in case it could be, like, you know, a tumour or cancer or something. So once I noticed that there was lumps on my legs, that was the first indication that something was going on with either my lymph nodes or my blood vessels.

Criss Hochhold

Then how long after the symptoms appeared did you contact your family doctor? I’m trying to understand: From the time you received the vaccine to the time the symptoms appeared and then you reported them to your physician, to your family doctor, how much time had lapsed?

Josephine Fillier

Maybe a month or two because I got it June 18, 2021. And then around the beginning of August, I made my first appointment, and then he basically brushed it off. So I just, you know, went home. And the fall came and then the winter came, and more and more symptoms started happening.

Criss Hochhold

Do you know if your family doctor submitted any of your symptoms to the CAERS system: the Canadian vaccine reporting system? Are you aware of any of that?

Josephine Fillier

The CAERS? No, I had to do that myself. Like I said, he was gaslighting me. He even said to me that it is not connected to the vaccine, the COVID injection. Because he knew of somebody who impersonated someone and took 77 injections, and they’re fine.

Criss Hochhold

I believe that reference is in regards to a person in Germany, and it was reported in the media, who took a number of extra vaccinations in order for the benefit financially. Whether it’s proven or not, I’m not certain of.

[00:10:00]

Josephine, your family doctor didn’t accept the symptoms that you were showing physically. Not only from a psychological perspective, perhaps due to anxiety or depression or heightened anxiety, because of what you’ve written from the research, but you actually had physical ailments, physical symptoms, and your doctor was completely dismissive of that. Did you seek a second opinion? Were you able to perhaps go to the ER or the hospital to speak to another physician about that?

Josephine Fillier

No, because, like I said, this doctor has been my doctor since I was 10. I literally trusted him with my entire life. Like, I didn’t know about the injections; I didn’t know about anything at this time. I just knew that something was wrong with my body, and I needed to find out what it was because I did not feel well at all. I felt like I was dying.

Criss Hochhold

Did your doctor run any tests on your blood, for example, or any other tests to ascertain, to see what potentially, if there’s an issue?

Josephine Fillier

Yeah, I actually had to have a severe mental breakdown in his doctor’s office about a year ago in order for him to do anything. But he gaslit me so much for a long time. And then I had to, like, literally cry out for help saying, “I know something is wrong with me. I need help.”

Nobody believed me because my own partner didn’t believe me; my family didn’t believe me; my friends didn’t believe me. And I needed some help. I felt so alone and I needed a professional at least to acknowledge me. And so, he ended up getting me a referral to a neurologist. He gave me blood work for just, like, you know, regular calcium, proteins, and all this stuff. And then that came back normal. So then, somebody told me to get a D-dimer test done. So I went back a couple of weeks later, got that done, that came back normal.

Then I was suffering with vertigo this summer just past, in 2022. And I felt like I was drunk. And I’m taking care of my kids and I was feeling so sick for a week. And I couldn’t walk, I felt really unwell. So then he got me a CRP test done to see if I had chronic inflammation and that came back normal. So I just saw my neurologist on Thursday past, and he now told me that it could possibly be this dysautonomia, and it’s an autoimmune response to the vaccine. And then he told me that I need to get an MRI done and I need to get a lot of blood work to see if it’s an autoimmune response and to also check for connective tissue damage.

Criss Hochhold

For the commissioners, the lab report as well as the outpatient specimen collection requisition would be exhibited as TR-21, TR-21a through to f. TR-21, TR-21a through to f. That also includes the immunization record.

Josephine, how did it make you feel when, bearing in mind we were becoming a bit of a national—

I’m going to skip forward just a little bit in the interest of time because I think we have an understanding how you were feeling at the time and everything you went through.

Did you go to the Freedom Convoy?

Josephine Fillier

Oh yeah, I found out about the convoy on Saturday and then everything was planned for me to leave on Monday in order to go to the Trucker Convoy.

Criss Hochhold

Thank you. What happened as a result of your attendance of the Freedom Convoy?

Josephine Fillier

Well, I took myself off of my medication because I no longer trusted pharmaceuticals because of my injury. And so, I also took my children out of school for those two weeks while I was gone because they just came back after another lockdown and I didn’t want to put a mask on their face. So I ended up going to the Trucker Convoy and my social worker, who has been involved with my file for a while, she thought I was having severe mental breakdown.

[00:15:00]

So when I came back February 7th into Newfoundland, on February 8th she came and told me that they had to remove my children until further investigation.

Criss Hochhold

When were the kids removed from your custody?

Josephine Fillier

February 8th, my two boys.

Criss Hochhold

Of last year, of 2022.

Josephine Fillier

Yeah.

Criss Hochhold

We’re sorry to hear that. And you’re working on this actively to regain custody of your children?

Josephine Fillier

Yeah, well, my oldest has come home as of December. But my youngest is having some behavioural issues at school, so my social worker wants to make sure that I am, you know, okay with my mental health and he has support and I have support before he can return home. But he’s in the process of transitioning back.

Criss Hochhold

Very good. Just a couple of more questions. You said that you’ve come off medication earlier this year. Can you just briefly describe what medication you were on and what it was for?

Josephine Fillier

Well, I don’t remember the name of my antidepressant, but I was on antidepressants. And then I was on lorazepam for my anxiety because I was in abusive relationships and had childhood trauma. So I have severe PTSD from all of that. But everything was fine; it’s just that, since I got this injection into my body and I knew something was seriously wrong, I no longer trusted pharmaceuticals or doctors.

Criss Hochhold

You said you’ve had anxiety and depression since childhood, which you also said got heightened because of the vaccination. How was your mental health affected after you received the vaccination? Did your symptoms increase or did they stay about the same? What happened?

Josephine Fillier

My symptoms seriously increased from, basically, depression and anxiety to severe panic attacks where I felt like I was having a heart attack constantly. I had chest pains, electrical shocks in my chest. I had chronic fatigue and anger issues and then basically just escalated from that to—

I had a tremor in my leg last April, because I was out for a walk and I became chilly. And my right leg, when I came home, I put my feet on the heater like I normally do to warm up and then my leg just started shaking uncontrollably. It’s basically affected my entire nervous system. I have severe nerve pain, like my feet go on fire, and it’s mostly my right leg. That’s what I don’t understand. Like, I guess since I had the bruise there. With my research, the spike protein possibly started, like, attacking that one part of my body and then it spread throughout my entire system. But even now, my neurologist checked my leg, and he said that my right leg is much more weaker than my left leg. So I have a severe pain all the time, like, numbness, my foot goes numb, it goes on fire. Crawling and pins and needles, shooting pains, stabbing.

Criss Hochhold

Thank you, Josephine. I really appreciate it. While I do have more questions, I do not have more time. So I’m going to refer to the commissioners for any follow-up questions.

No questions. Thank you, Josephine. I really appreciate your time.

Josephine Fillier

Thank you.

[00:19:34]

Final Review and Approval:  Jodi Bruhn, August 3, 2023.   

The evidence offered in this transcript is a true and faithful record of witness testimony given during the National Citizens Inquiry (NCI) hearings. The transcript was prepared by members of a team of volunteers using an “intelligent verbatim” transcription method.

For further information on the transcription process, method, and team, see the NCI website: https://nationalcitizensinquiry.ca/about-these-transcripts/

Summary

Mother of 2 boys explains vaccine injury after a shot she didn’t want was needed in order for her to travel to see her partner. Within the day started to have severe pain. Family doctor of 23 years did not listen to her. Friends and family would not listen to her about vaccine issues. She shared that her boys were taken away from her after going to Freedom Convoy. She is still suffering and has no solutions to her pains but neurologist suggested Autonomia – an autoimmune response to the vaccine.

Quotes/Snipits/Clips

“He’s been my doctor for 23 years now. He knows my entire medical history, my mom, my sister, all of our kids. And he gas lit me the entire time. I was telling him about the lumps on my legs and he just told me to get compression socks. I told him about lumps in my scalp, in my head, that were very painful. And this remark was really, really upsetting because he told me that if I didn’t look for lumps, I wouldn’t find any. And I thought that, you know, if you check lumps, you have to check your body. You have to be self-aware. You have to understand your symptoms in case it could be, like, you know, it’s your answer or something. So once I noticed that there was lumps on my legs, that was the first indication that something was going on with either my lymph nodes or my blood vessels.”

“I had to like literally cry out for help saying, I know something is wrong with me. I need help. Nobody believed me because my own partner didn’t believe me. My family didn’t believe me. My friends didn’t believe me and I needed some help. I felt so alone and I needed a professional at least to acknowledge me.”