Woman Goes Into Septic Shock After Giving Birth & Loses Her Hand and Feet | Her Kids Became Her Motivation to Recover

A Texas woman who nearly lost her life after giving birth got back home this month and is reunited with her now-4-month-old daughter and 2-year-old son. Krystina Pacheco, 29, of Pleasanton, Texas, gave birth to her daughter Amelia on October 24, 2022, in what she described as an uneventful C-section delivery, reported Good Morning America.

Two days later, she was discharged from the hospital but Pacheco started feeling feverish and assumed it was just part of her recovery post-C-section. She was given ibuprofen by a nurse. When she did not see any improvement in her health, Pacheco said she went to see a doctor, who sent her to a local emergency room. Pacheco was soon airlifted to a hospital in San Antonio, where doctors discovered her body was in septic shock.

"I just remember I couldn’t breathe anymore and I couldn’t see anymore and I just started slowly fading out," Pacheco told ABC News. "My husband, I could just hear him saying, 'Please come back to us, please, your babies need you. I need you. I need you to be here and help me with our babies,' and that's the last thing I remember."

Septic shock is the most dangerous stage of sepsis, which occurs when a body responds severely to an infection. According to the National Institutes of Health, "without quick treatment, it can lead to tissue damage, organ failure, and even death." According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, sepsis is the second leading cause of pregnancy-related death in the United States, behind only cardiovascular conditions.

In Pacheco's case, sepsis began to affect her heart, lungs, and kidneys, according to her husband, Jacob Pacheco. The life-saving treatments and medication Pacheco was given to get the condition under control, unfortunately, cut off the circulation of blood to her hands and feet, resulting in the necessity to amputate them.

"My hands and feet were black. They looked like a person who had gotten frostbite," Pacheco told ABC, adding that her medical team had done everything possible to avoid getting to this point. "I was just breaking down and being absolutely crushed," she said, of learning about the necessity for amputations. "And crying with my family, crying with Jacob, and just being sad that my life would no longer be the same," she added.

However, Pacheco kept moving forward thinking of her children. "Every day I woke up and thought about my babies and every time I went into surgery, my thought was, I have to get home to be with my babies, so if that means going through one more surgery, then ultimately I have to go through another surgery," she said. "They were my number one motivation, hands down."

In late January 2023, Krystina Pacheco was discharged from the hospital and shifted to TIRR Memorial Hermann, a rehabilitation center in Houston. Dr. Vinay Vanodia, medical director of the rehabilitation program said, "when we went to see her, she was such a bright light and it just changed the whole mood. Any challenge we put in front of her, she was able to accomplish." 

On February 11, more than 100 days after she was hospitalized and away from her newborn daughter and son, Krystina Pacheco was able to return home. "I cried," she said of the moment she arrived home. "I hugged [Jacob] really right. He knew I was overcome with emotions."

References:

https://www.goodmorningamerica.com/wellness/story/woman-septic-shock-after-giving-birth-feet-hands-97338209

https://abcnews.go.com/GMA/Wellness/video/mom-hands-feet-amputated-after-septic-shock-after-97426988

https://www.cdc.gov/reproductivehealth/maternal-mortality/pregnancy-mortality-surveillance-system.htm?

Cover Image Source: Youtube | KHOU -11