Kate S.
The progression of my symptoms was like a landslide. I awoke feeling wrong, noticed a fever. The next morning, I began shaking uncontrollably, having trouble walking. I even became delirious -waking up in the evening and thinking it was the morning, crying for hours for no reason. I’ve replayed this sequence so many times in my head that it seems to have lasted for weeks, but in reality it only took days for the illness to progress to a point of danger.
Perhaps too late, I spoke with my parents and my father drove four hours to pick me up at my college, where I was car-less. He drove me home to Iowa and it felt nice to be home. I felt better. But despite this temporary alleviation, my illness progressed. I remember taking a bath and beginning to shake so violently that water splashed out onto the floor. I remember having conversations that made no sense, dreams the clashed with reality. By Friday, I had been successfully convinced that I needed to see a doctor. “We think you’re fine,” he said, “but we’re going to send you for some blood tests just in case.” We drove across town to the hospital where my blood was taken, and by the time we got home, they were calling. “Come to the ER right now.”
I remember going to the ER. I remember the word ‘sepsis’ and I remember beginning to shake uncontrollably. I remember being wheeled to the ICU, begging for water. I remember answering questions and having a PICC line inserted. I remember trying to fall asleep and waking up feeling like there were spiders in my lungs.
And then I stop remembering.
I still don’t have a clear picture of what happened next, but this is what I understand:
On Saturday, I seemed to improve a little. My sisters and parents visited me in the ICU and my spirits seemed high. But it still wasn’t good. Although sepsis generally responds to intravenous antibiotics, the strong medicines being pumped into my veins were not curbing the devastation being wrought by the poison in my blood. I progressed into septic shock. At some point, I appeared to show symptoms of pneumonia, but it turned out to be my lungs filling with blood.
On Sunday, March 11, 2012 my body started losing. I entered renal and respiratory failure. My heart could not keep up with the infection, and pressors were injected to force it to keep beating, faster and harder. I was intubated, allowing a ventilator to breathe for me. I was medivaced by helicopter to the Medical ICU at the University of Iowa Hospitals in Iowa City. My mother was told that I might not survive the trip and my father drove to Iowa City so quickly that he beat the helicopter.
I’m not sure if I don’t remember these things because I was so heavily sedated or if these memories are repressed in a deep, deep corner of my brain. I am captivated by these days of mental darkness, with death so close and poison in my blood. But at the same time, I am incredibly grateful for this lapse in memory. I can’t say it enough: It was worse for my family than it was for me. Had my role been reversed with any one of them, I don’t know that I would have been as strong as they were.
As if by miracle, I started getting better. On Wednesday, my breathing tube was removed and I started breathing on my own, sans ventilator. I started remembering blurs of loving faces: my parents, sisters, brother-in-law, dear friends, and the medical staff. Slowly, they became clearer. I sat, then stood, then walked. My sister wheeled me out to the balcony of the hospital and the sun was warm and healing. I began receiving a flood of notes and emails from friends, family, and even strangers who had heard about my situation. The love emanating from these people hit me like a ton of bricks. I honestly think all the good energy being sent to me was partially responsible for my recovery, and for that I cannot be more grateful. Even now, I sometimes go back and look at those notes. They make me feel strong.
Although my diagnosis was officially sepsis, many things about my illness remain a mystery. I remember a doctor in the ICU stating that I would not be discharged until my illness was figured out, but as I kept becoming healthier it became apparent that I did not need to stay. After a week in the ICU, I was transferred to the general hospital then eventually discharged. I am still a medical mystery.
I tried to bounce back as quickly as I had fallen. I returned to school in Minnesota and threw myself so vehemently into my studies that I was able to complete the semester after missing an entire month. Many of my classmates did not know what had happened to me, and as I returned 12 pounds lighter and in awe of the world, I subconsciously decided to try to move on rather than make sense of what I had been through.
That decision backfired on me a few months later, as summer began. I acted out of character, I didn’t tell anyone what I was feeling, I made poor decisions. One day, I was driving to the grocery store and I had to pull over because nothing made sense. I don’t know how else to describe it: nothing made sense.
After the summer, I studied abroad for a semester then returned to college in the spring. During this time, I could no longer avoid the realities of my illness. I began thinking about it all the time: on the bus, at dinner, in class. I was so tired all the time, and I almost never felt safe. I could not focus and would oftentimes lay in bed, stressing about things I needed to do but not being able to do any of them. Although I had been diagnosed with sepsis very quickly, no one once told me anything about what would happen afterwards. I spent a good part of the spring thinking I was going crazy or there was some major illness that the doctors were overlooking. I saw two doctors and a counselor, and none provided me with support or treatment that I needed, though I was admittedly reluctant to disclose the full details of my condition with them.
I am incredibly fortunate in that I eventually found that support and treatment in my family, my friends, my work, music, and online communities of sepsis survivors. Since this spring, I feel as if I have turned around completely. I am strong and I am happy. I now understand that the year following my illness was marked by elements of both post-ICU syndrome and post-sepsis syndrome. (Sepsis and Post-Sepsis Syndrome) My brain is different than it was prior to sepsis, and it makes some things harder. I still get nervous whenever I feel the slightest bit ill or smell saline in the air or hear a helicopter. I still have moments when I cannot tear my mind away from my hospital room. But understanding the reality of post-ICU and post-sepsis syndromes has allowed me to understand what a life-changing experience this has been, rather than a solitary event that acted upon my body at a singular point in time. Surviving is about allowing your experiences to propel you forward in time and growth, rather than holding you prisoner.
