Amanda McNeely thought her 4-year-old son Kierken was suffering from a case from croup, which he had had before.
But it turned out to be a case of strep throat that turned sepsis and almost took his life.
“My husband and I were oblivious to the days that were about to come — some of the hardest of our lives,” McNeely told Love What Matters.
Now she’s warning parents about the dangers of sepsis after her son was given a 5 percent chance of surviving and did.
McNeely took her son to the doctor and he was given a steroid and sent home.
It wasn’t long before the situation took a drastic turn for the worse.
“By around 4 p.m. Kierken was still coughing really badly and crying about his head hurting. We planned on heading back to the doctor, but he fell asleep and I decided to take a quick shower before we left.,” she explained. “About 10 minutes later, my husband started yelling that Kierken wasn’t breathing right. His lungs had collapsed!”
Her son was rushed to the hospital in an ambulance then later transferred to Arkansas Children’s Hosptial.
Kierken’s blood pressure plummeted and before they knew it he needed to be resuscitated twice.
“He was so bruised and swollen, his heart didn’t beat for the next 4 days, but he was stable thanks to the ECMO machine,” McNeely recalls. “On Saturday morning we were informed they found out what Kierken’s infection was: he had Group A Strep, and it was in his bloodstream. Kierken was very sick and his chances of survival were low, but we never gave up hope.”
The McNeely’s found out that their son wouldn’t survive the next three hours without surgery but was given a 5 percent chance of surviving the surgery. And “by the grace of God” Kierken survived.
It was the first time that the hospital had ever performed the surgery.
Kierken, thankfully, began to recover but had to be weaned off his medication and had to relearn how to do the simplest of things like sit up, stand, walk, and eat. He was in the children’s hospital for seven-and-a-half-months.
Thankfully, Kierken, who is now 7 or 8-years-old, has recovered and finally got to go back to school and resume the normal life of a child.
He does need surgery in June to separate his vocal chords since they fused together when he was on the ventilator.
“Those days were some of the absolute worst days in my almost 31 yrs. They changed me. I learned so much. My eyes opened, life is precious, don’t take anything for granted, appreciate all the small things, cherish those you love, don’t stress over small shit, and family…nothing is as important as family,” McNeely wrote on Facebook. “
Now McNeely wants parents to know how to protect their children from similar situations.
“My warning to other parents is to research and understand more about sepsis. It is more common than people realize. Kierken’s happened from strep… strep is a common illness with kids and people don’t understand what it can do if not caught, and strep is just one of the common illnesses it could start from,” she says.
“I honestly had no idea. Septic shock is a very real thing and takes more lives than you know. If you feel like something isn’t right, speak up, push for tests, take control, and be more aware. It could save your child’s life. Nobody thinks it’ll happen to them, but it can, and unfortunately, it does.”
You can learn more about the signs and symptoms of sepsis here.
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