Because of those painkillers, I thought I was well enough to go for the second audition a few days later. I dragged myself from Oxford to London and that’s the last thing I remember until being rushed to intensive care. My parents told me that I was barely coherent, unable to form full sentences and breathing really quickly, and so they called 111 again. To this day, I don’t know the name of that 111 clinician, but I absolutely owe her my life because she told my dad: “I don’t want to scare you, but it sounds like your daughter has sepsis. I’m going to ring you an ambulance, and I just want you to keep saying to them, it could be sepsis.”
Being in intensive care was the most terrifying thing because there’s a lot of noises and people rushing about, and I was on a high flow oxygen ventilator, being pumped full of broad-spectrum antibiotics. A couple of days later, they had time to test blood samples and they found that I’d had an invasive Strep A infection, which was everywhere at the time, and it had caused septic arthritis, which was why I had so much pain in my hip and shoulder. It had also resulted in respiratory failure which was why my oxygen levels had dropped so low.
I spent six or seven days in total in intensive care and then when I was moved back to the ward, I started to recover more quickly, and I was home within 10 days. My overwhelming feeling was just gratitude that I’m still here because there were points where we didn’t think that would happen. That autumn, lots of children sadly lost their lives from sepsis as a result of invasive Strep A infections, so I feel very grateful and lucky to be alive.
However, the whole recovery process has been much longer than I expected. There’s lots of side effects after sepsis, like fatigue which is something I never thought I would experience at 21 years old. Even something as simple as getting out of bed and walking to the toilet would leave me completely out of breath. I also had a lot of hair loss; I had a bald patch on the back of my head for a while which really knocked my confidence.
Sarah Carter is a health and wellness expert residing in the UK. With a background in healthcare, she offers evidence-based advice on fitness, nutrition, and mental well-being, promoting healthier living for readers.
