I lost all my limbs after raging sepsis killed them while in month-long coma
A WOMAN woke up from a sepsis coma to find that her legs and arms had "died" - and all four limbs had to be removed.
Kathleen Maher, 46, was caring for her now late-mum when she suddenly passed out at home.
She was rushed to hospital where medics discovered that she had multiple organ failure and sepsis due to a string of infections.
Kathleen, from South Shields, was put into a coma and awake a month later to find her limbs turning black.
The former secretary said: "Waking up like that - after that second operation - was mortifying.
"You can't imagine how it is to have one life where you go on nice walks, drive about, and do kettlebell exercises with your best friends twice a week.
"And then to go to this other life, where - to start with - your limbs are black, you can't move them, and the next minute they're gone.
"It was like something out of a horror story, what happened."
It turned out that she had developed necrosis, a flesh-eating bug which kills off healthy cells.
Kathleen was a live-in carer for her mum who had dementia.
One night, she started to feel shivery, achy and had no appetite - later passing out while making her mum's bed.
She was found at the foot of the bed by her brother Anthony.
Medics discovered she had multiple organ failure caused by several major infections - including double pneumonia, endocarditis, influenza B, and sepsis.
Doctors have not been able to establish how she contracted the infections.
Six weeks after collapsing, she woke up to find that all four limbs were unusable.
"It was just a horrible experience waking up like that," she said.
"I couldn't move my hands or feet - I couldn't even lift my head, it was that bad."
Kathleen broke down - and doubted whether or not she had the strength to go through the ordeal.
"It was absolutely heartbreaking - even though I was told it was the only option, you just think in your heart of hearts you don't know if you can go through with it.
"I knew, though, after that, there'd be serious complications - and since I wasn't expected to live without the operations, they were all that would save me."
Kathleen had two six-hour operations over two consecutive weeks in April - first to remove her legs six inches below the knee, then her arms five inches above the elbow.
When she came round after her second operation, Kathleen had a tracheotomy - an incision made to fit a tube into her windpipe - to help her breathe.
The pneumonia had left her so weak that she also had severely reduced lung capacity, and spent some days "constantly coughing like an old man".
Symptoms of sepsis
If you, a loved one, or in the case of medical professionals their patient, feels "severely sick", doesn't appear to be themselves and shows any of the following symptoms, sepsis should be suspected:
- weakness
- loss of appetite
- fever and chills
- thirst
- difficult or rapid breathing
- rapid heart rate
- low blood pressure
- low urine output
If a person is suffering these symptoms and they are thought to have suffered an infection - pneumonia, abdominal infection, urinary infection, or a wound - sepsis is a likely cause.
"I was so poorly," she said.
"I couldn't even lift my head, and my brothers and sisters used to have to lift my head and position it if I needed it positioning.
"I was getting so frustrated to the point of tears - it was horrible to go through.
"I thought I was going to be like this for the rest of my life, but I realised that at least I have a rest of my life to be like this at all."
Kathleen was given prosthetic arms and legs in October.
Had it not been for her siblings, Kathleen said she wouldn't have been able to cope.
"My brothers and my sisters didn't leave my side for the first couple of months - and they've only just started leaving me alone now," she joked.
"I've had family around me all the time, and they've seen me at my very worst, in the months after the operations I had.
"I'm trying to just not be too down all the time, because that won't help me.
"I don't know if I could have gotten through without them. They've been wonderful."
After a series of life-saving amputations, she is now limbless, almost mute, incredibly weak and very sick.
Kathleen has regained some of her former strength, however, and now relied on prosthetics to get around.
"And it's so important not to get my hopes up too much either about whether or not I'll make a full recovery or ever be like I was before everything.
"I just know that's not going to happen, so I have to be realistic - otherwise the depression will seep in if I expect too much too soon."
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