Samantha Blackwell

August 9, 2014, was the birth of my son. It was a smooth vaginal birth. I only pushed for about 25 minutes. Shortly after his birth, it was brought to my attention that a sponge was missing. After an x-ray, the hospital confirmed that the sponge had not been left in me. I was sent home with no question.

The first couple of days I felt great. I was able to get back to pretty much everything I usually do. Then the fever started. I had chills and had some cramping in my abdomen. Since this was my first child, I figured it was part of my body adjusting from the birth. I continued with those symptoms for a couple of days. They didn’t get worse or less during that time.

It was August 20th, 11 days after having my son. I woke up in the middle of the night in excruciating pain. I had no idea what was going on. Being someone with a very high pain tolerance, I was worried that something could cause me such pain. I woke my husband up to rush me to the hospital. The last thing I remember was getting my blood pressure checked. I woke up in the ICU more than a month later.

According to my friends and family I was taken in for a D&C, where they found a mass that they removed. They also found an infection in my uterus that later spread to my abdomen. I had to have all of my organs rinsed and a lot of fluid and pus removed. I was placed in a medically induced coma. I had drains and a wound vac attached to my open abdomen so they could get in and out of my body without having to cut me open again.

After waking up, I had to be placed on a feeding tube because the ventilator caused damage. I had to learn to walk, talk and eat again – things I always took for granted.

Waking up more than a month later and thinking it was the same day was the most horrifying thing ever. I don’t remember all of the bad stuff. I try not to discuss too much of it with my husband and family because I can see the pain they went through just watching me. I missed out on a lot of time with my son. I know he doesn’t remember it. I spent the longest time thinking it was my fault not knowing my own body and thinking it was part of recovering from childbirth.

Once I did some research on sepsis and realised I’m not alone and there are a lot of people who have no idea what it is I felt a lot better. I would love to spread awareness. (Sepsis and Pregnancy & Childbirth)

It took me over a year to be able to post my story. Now I am proud to have gone through what I went through. I am one of the very few that fully go into septic shock and survive to talk about it. I am a survivor.