January 16, 2019 would normally have been a day of celebrating my daughter’s birthday, except I was trying to survive a critical situation.
I tried to joke while laying in the hospital emergency room, crying from the pain in my left side, that I had pain like this 23 year ago, but at least at the end of it, I also had a tiny being in my arms. What would possibly come of this? What was wrong with me?
Doped up on morphine for the pain and my boyfriend by my side, I went through ultra sounds and a CT scan. I had a kidney stone. A really big kidney stone. It wasn’t going to pass, and I would need surgery. I also had a kidney infection. Did I know about the infection? Nope. I had zero symptoms. No clue I had been sick until that morning when I could barely walk and was vomiting.
Over 8 hours I spent that morning at the hospital on pain medication until they finally thought I was well enough to go home. If I started feeling worse that I would need to come back, “there is a chance you could become septic”. “Remember to contact the urologist in the morning to schedule surgery”. I would never get that chance.
No less than two hours later, I laid on our bed, and watched as my boyfriend called 911. He pleaded with them to hurry. I was, indeed, dying. I knew it too. It was the most helpless feeling, laying there knowing that there was absolutely nothing that I could do to change the course of events that was happening. Would I last until the ambulance got there? Would I die in our bed? I didn’t want to die in our bed. I didn’t want him to watch me die either. I didn’t want any of my loved ones to witness my death.
The ambulance showed up, and I was on my way to the hospital. All medication they tried to give me in the ambulance, I vomited up. The tech was having difficulties getting an IV in my arm. I didn’t care. I just didn’t want to die in the ambulance.
Things after that were hectic. The same ER doctor told me that they were going to be transferring me to another hospital. I had sepsis and I had went into sepsis shock. They needed to put an IV in my neck to be able to give me medicine to keep me alive. I asked her if I was going by ambulance. She said “If you go by ambulance you won’t make it. You are being airlifted. The helicopter is on its way.”
I joked when with the air crew as they loaded me into the helicopter. Told them that I always wanted to ride in a helicopter, but this wasn’t the way I wanted it. It was dark, I couldn’t see because I was strapped to a board, and I just wanted to sleep. They wouldn’t let me sleep though. They kept asking me if I was still with them.
I don’t remember much after arriving at Aspirus Wausau. It was a whirlwind. I was going to get a port put in a vein in my neck for the medicine to stabilize me. The anesthesiologist was on his way to get me ready for emergency surgery. The kidney stone had moved and was blocking the flow. I said “Maurice is trying to kill me”. I felt I had no other choice but to name the very item that was trying to take me from this earth. They must have all thought I had lost my mind. I must be hallucinating. I don’t remember much after the trauma doctor put the port in my neck. I was asleep before I made it half way to surgery to have a stint put in to move the kidney stone out of the way.
I only spent a few hours in ICU which is almost crazy for someone who was in the condition I was in when I arrived. According to sources, the mortality rate of SIRS ranges from 6% to 7% and in septic shock amounts to over 50%. In particular, abdominal sepsis exhibits the highest mortality rate with 72%. The long-term prognosis is equally poor; only approximately 30% survived the first year after hospital admission.
My daughter came down and spend the morning in ICU with me. My sister would take days off from work to stay in that hospital by my side taking care of me better than any one nurse ever could. I was in constant contact with my boyfriend who needed to be home to take care of our pets. I was in good hands.
I spent less than a week in the hospital and was sent home. I ended up readmitted to the local hospital a few days later because the sepsis came back. At least I was close to home this time, and my boyfriend and mom could come see me. I was off from work for close to two months. I would have surgery to break up the kidney stone after the infection was gone, and then later have the stint removed.
Tomorrow morning will be my day of celebrating my one year of surviving. The trauma that came from that night, it hasn’t left. It is still very fresh in my mind, and PTSD is real from health trauma.
I am lucky. One of the few lucky ones to have survived septic shock. I am also one of the few ones to have gone through such a health crisis and have good health insurance. I cannot imagine what I would have done if I didn’t. It took me almost a year to finally add up all the bills to see how much my life was “worth”.
You’re reading that correctly - $134,523.21, of which $42,000.00 of it was for the medevac helicopter. We are still working with the insurance company to cover that bill. When I say I support Healthcare for All - this is why. No one - absolutely no one - should have to worry about how much their life is worth. They should have zero worries when it comes to how are they going to pay a $200.00 doctor bill or over $100k in medical bills. Every life is worth something, and I have no problem paying more in taxes if it means no one will have to think about how much their life is worth and if they can afford to survive.
