My experience with sepsis involves infertility and IVF. For anyone reading this who may be experiencing either of those, please understand that this story might be triggering but it does end well. For context, during this period of my life I had a three-year-old daughter, a husband and was generally healthy.
Between March 2022 and February 2023, I had lost three pregnancies. Those eleven months of my life were very traumatic and devastating for myself and my husband. After experiencing so many losses in such a short period of time we decided to try IVF. I had two cycles in total. Both failed. The first cycle led to no embryos being viable, and the second led to only one frozen embryo that might not be viable. This sepsis story involves my second, and final, round of IVF.
May, 2023: My second IVF cycle
After several days of hormone injections and scans, I was ready to have my eggs collected in the hope that we could make some embryos. I went in to outpatient surgery for egg collection (or harvesting), which is considered a low-risk and minimally invasive procedure, after saying goodbye to my husband and daughter. I knew exactly what to expect. In and out in a couple of hours. I was just hoping the surgeon would get more mature eggs the second time around. I got my wish! We got about 14 mature eggs and most were easily fertilised! Three embryos made it to day 8, which is the stage where we can test them genetically. Unfortunately, all embryos were genetically abnormal. Another failed IVF round. However, it was more than just a failed IVF round, it was a deadly one.
I remember leaving the IVF clinic after the harvest and wishing the woman next to me good luck. Little did I know that I’d need all the luck I could get over the next week. During the egg harvest I had contracted a group A streptococcus (group A strep or GAS) infection, which led to sepsis. Not only did our second IVF round fail, I also nearly died.
I was so extremely sick after the egg harvest. It was like I had the worst gastro ever. My specialist thought I might have ovarian hyperstimulation syndrome (OHSS), which can happen during IVF, and told me that if pain and antinausea medication weren’t working and I got worse to call an ambulance. After 48 hours of agony, it was time to call it. I needed to get to the hospital. I remember telling my husband that I was feeling like I was going to die. Bizarrely, I was right. He called me an ambulance. However, I was considered low priority. An uber took me to hospital instead.
I was rushed to the resuscitation unit soon after reaching the hospital as my heart rate was extremely high and blood pressure was extremely low. I was put on life support straight away. Despite the doctors and nurses giving me all the medication they could, nothing was working. My inflammatory markers were extremely high, so the primary diagnosis of OHSS was wrong. They needed to operate to look for the source of infection. I needed an abdominal washout to clear the infection from my abdomen and confirm the source (they weren’t sure if my colon was damaged during the harvest, which might have led to an infection). They said I could die without the operation as their treatments weren’t working. I was scared. I didn’t want an operation, especially not one that could lead to a colostomy bag if my colon was the source of infection. But then I thought of my daughter and what was best for her. She needed her mother to be alive, with or without a colostomy bag. Once I started putting her needs first the decision was easy. I was to have the operation. I was operated on at 1am the next morning as an emergency case.
I remember telling the surgeon before I went under that he was not to perform a laparotomy unless he absolutely needed to. After rehabbing people after laparotomies in the hospital as a physio, I knew it was a hard road to travel. Eventually I woke up after the surgery and the first thing I asked was whether I had a laparotomy. No, I did not need a laparotomy, and I did not need a colostomy bag. I just needed a washout to get some serious bacteria out of my abdomen, which was done laparoscopically. I was one of the lucky ones.
After the surgery I had a wound drain and urinary catheter for almost a week as I stayed in the hospital, away from my family on Mother’s Day. When my daughter came to visit me on that day, I realised that I had been focusing so much on trying to have another child that I had forgot to appreciate what I had right in front of me. I almost died trying to have another child while not appreciating the one I already had. That was it. From then on, I was going to focus on what I have and I stopped being so focused on trying to achieve more.
Time in hospital was eye opening. As someone who used to work in one, it’s fascinating seeing it from the patient’s perspective. There is a lot of waiting around to learn what was to happen next. There’s a lot of moving from one part of the hospital to another, especially when I was first admitted. I remember being in the emergency department, then resus, then ICU, then surgery, then back to ICU, then off to the ward (as well as all the travel for tests in between). The ward was quiet despite the noise. It was like every patient there existed in their own little silo. We all had our own problems with the primary goal to get out of there. I wanted to get back to my family, hobbies and my own bed! I used my physio skills to begin my rehab. I walked a lap of the ward the day I arrived there from ICU and almost collapsed when I got back. It was like I had lost all of my conditioning over the few days I had been in hospital. My body was exhausted. Every day I walked a little more, did some steps, even went to the café and outdoors so I knew I’d be physically ready to leave once I was medically discharged. I also had to do it for my family who visited me every day as seeing me moving gave them confidence that I was recovering.
After over a week of being in hospital, I was discharged home. I was glad to be at home but I soon realised that, as a mum, home is not a place to relax and recover. The day-to-day tasks of simply keeping a home, even walking down the street to fill my prescription, was exhausting. However, I was very lucky. Many people who survive sepsis do not return to their former selves physically and/or mentally. I returned home with physical and psychological scars, but I did not lose limbs or any physical function that could not be rehabilitated. I realise how lucky I am and I truly think this outcome is due to me getting to the hospital in time and my hospital treating me in time for sepsis. Not everyone gets the treatment they need in the time it is needed and they suffer permanently for it.
I continued to see infectious diseases and cardiac specialists for several months post-discharge. Post-sepsis syndrome is real. I had brain fog, fatigue and could not physically function the way I previously had due to those things. I had nights where I couldn’t get to sleep because thoughts about my experience with sepsis came flooding back whenever the world would go silent. My heart took a beating (no pun intended) from sepsis, so it took some time for my cardiovascular fitness to return. My kidneys also took a while to return to full function. However, despite the ongoing difficulties I experienced, I fell pregnant naturally two months later.
Experiencing post-sepsis syndrome during pregnancy was interesting as many of the signs and symptoms overlap. Pregnancy can be physically taxing on the body, and my body was already exhausted after winning a fight against sepsis. Pregnancy can lead to brain fog, fatigue and can have negative impacts on mental health, which post-sepsis syndrome can too. So, it was very difficult for my specialists to distinguish between the two as the cause of my symptoms. Regardless, I continued to improve slowly with close monitoring. Our son was born healthy and happy on March 24, 2024, at the same hospital that saved my life.