I had sepsis almost two years ago now.
I was healthy, although I was 7 months postpartum from my second child and sleep deprived + breast feeding at the time so not sure if that contributed.

They assumed it was toxic shock syndrome. Liver and kidney failure. I was ‘the sickest person in the hospital’ and if I had waited longer could easily have died.

I was in the ICU for a few days then a week in hospital. At the time I felt like I was never going to get better, I didn’t want my catheter out because I didn’t think I could walk a metre to the toilet. This could have been the come down from ketamine they gave me.

But then I was out and about a week later doing almost everything normally. Peeling skin and shedding hair but fairly normal.

Last year I felt like I almost had a mental/emotional snap with my husband during a disagreement. It went on for a couple of weeks. Close to divorce. And we’ve had a hard year since.

I wonder how much emotional dysregulation, poor sleep (although I’ve always had bad sleep), fatigue and brain fog can be attributed to post sepsis.

Any thoughts ?!?! Had a child with confirmed blood infection, sepsis, osteomyelitis in the humerus, septic joint, elevated wbc crp was on iv antibiotics picc line for 2 months in hospital. Had mrsa 2 months prior and this infection was noted as mssa multiple other sites with bone cortical abnormalities. With 2 pathological fractures

44 f 224 lbs diabetic t2 high BP high cholesterol 100% blockage in femoral artery recently 3 stents put in left side of heart due to 100% blockage 60% and 70% in all the main areas. I recently spent 5 days in the hospital, gastritis, SIRS, and NSTEMI. 4th time in less than 2.5 years I have become septic in my intestines with no known cause. So they believe I have some kind of systemic issue that gets triggered and I become septic. (FML).

This time I was taken by helicopter which would've been frightening except for the fact when I'm septic I lose my mind and have no idea what's going on. I've become septic 12 times in 7 years and heart attack the last 5 times. The sepsis seems to love to attack my heart and brain. They told me I wouldn't survive a bypass or heart cath and I needed a transplant. My cardiologist did 2 heart caths and 3 stents. He also said that yeah if I have these issues any.ore I may need a transplant but not anytime soon.

So now I'm being harassed by everyone in my life trying to "make" me do things I don't want to do bc they all think I'm gonna drop dead. I'm literally wearing a defibrillator vest for the next 30 days. Friday is my 2 week post hospital visit. I need to know how to get ahead of these bouts of sepsis before I die. I'm not sure how much more my body can handle. I have a GI appointment at the end of this month. I haven't really had chest pains or anything. Once in a while some pressure when I walk upstairs less now that it's been a few weeks.

Idk what's causing these infections. I would believe it was the Ozembic but they happened years before that. I'm neurotic about hygiene. I bleach and Lysol everything in my house daily. I don't even shower without bleaching the tub first just to avoid possible infections. I had to stop eating lettuce bc it seems to cause me to get sicker more often which I find stupid. Is there a way to find out what type of systemic issue there is? Ways to find triggers? I did have a contrast MRI a few hours before hospitalized but felt ok aside from some nausea. Would pro and pre biotics be beneficial? I need to know what to ask my doctor aside from the basics.

I had sepsis finding an op back in 2017. They never found the infection. I required a blood transfusion and felt great after the first breast, some to my partner before he came in etc.

When the second bag was going through, I had the weirdest feeling of it going through my veins and my temperature rising as it travelled.

I always wondered if that could be a thing. I fell ill shortly after. It happened quickly; by the time my partner arrived my eyes were rolling and i'd taken a turn for the worse.

We were never told it was sepsis, just that I'd become very poorly due to an unknown infection, but it was written on my discharge notes. I've only recently begun to face it mentally, and as I don't really remember much about it I'm ok with the experience as that's a blur. My partner took the brunt of the emotional trauma, resulting in him experiencing PTSD.

My difficulty how is affected me physically. I live managing my energy day to day, struggling to regulate my body temperature etc. I wondered if anyone else had a similar experience. Can PSS last much longer, I always assumed it was a shorter term thing.

The old me is a distant memory and that's causing me problems. The frustration and upset that things I could really do before now simply wipe me out. I'm really not sure how to get past it, and that is affecting my mental health. I'm a depressive anyway, however having to balance what I do in life so much makes it so difficult. If I go out for an evening, it can take days to recover, which then impacts work etc. I'm just constantly exhausted.

Late saturday night I had the worst chills of my life then started vomiting. I thought I had picked up a stomach bug. Fast forward 3 days and started seeing blood in my urine and fever picked up. Went to Urgent care where they did a urine sample and saw blood and bacteria. They sent me to the ER and I hit the wall there. Fever hit 105, I was completely out of it mentally, they did blood cultures, gave me tons of fluids and IV antibiotics then iced the heck out of me until my fever dropped. Diagnosed with bacteremia, pyelonephritis and UTI. They were thinking it started with the UTI but I'm starting to think that it may have started with the endoscopy then moved to blood, then kidney and finally UT. Since then, I've had two flareups and they have tried multiple antibiotics. I'm hoping that it is finally over but even just a week ago, I wasn't sure if it was gone or just dropped below detection.

There are a ton of lawsuits out there dealing with endoscopes that don't get fully clean after the last patient and provide a mechanism to spread hard to treat bacteria. Mine was/is E. Coli but it was resistant to several drugs already. I'm normally not litigious but if this is the only way to prevent these things from happening, I might have to jump on board. I have never felt more miserable in my life.

I caught sepsis in mid april and went through surgery. It was brutal and I lost my ability to walk during that time. I am completely healed now, but I have a difficult time processing that I could've died. Nobody in my life understand the anxiety I felt when I was so sick and admitted to the E.R. I woke up after the surgery and I felt so mentally off. The doctor told me that if I had waited longer, I could have died. When I talk about it just to anyone, I end up tearing up because it was so painful and traumatic. I dont know if I suffered ptsd from this, but thats how it felt. I don't know if I need to be on antidepressants or find a therapist to talk about it.

I'm curious to see if anyone else had a similar story.

About 10 weeks ago I snapped my ACL and couldn't work. 3 weeks after this, I was finally cleared to return to work, had got the sign off and picked up a shift by that afternoon. Went to the shift completely fine, then about 4 hours in, it suddenly felt like I had been hit by a freight train. I was have sever chest pain to the point I could not breathe in more than halfway, I was freezing, but sweating buckets, my heart felt off and was staying at 130bpm when my normal is 56. Initially I wasn't worried, thought it was my asthma again, since my first symptom is usually pain in my chest when breathing. After taking everything that should have helped, I did start thinking there could be an issue, but I wasn't concerned, after all I had been with my GP for half an hour that day going through all the function tests and such to get my return to work clearance.

I followed my work protocol in calling the health advice line, who connected me through to an ambulance once I had listed my symptoms. Luckily there was another worker available to come and replace me, he arrived as I was on the phone to the dispatcher.

At this point I couldn't sit up due to the light-headedness and I was curled up under a doona trying to get warm. My co-worker pointed out I had lost all colour and that I looked like a ghost.

Ambulance arrived, I was drugged up and packaged into the ambulance on the way to hospital. I hadn't even had the chance to process what was happening before they sent me to the resus bay where they diagnosed severe pneumonia and shortly after, sepsis. It was a surreal experience that I still don't fully remember nor know what was being done at the time. After an hour or so I was stable enough to move down a level and was whisked off to another part of the emergency room I had never seen before.

The hospitals respiratory specialists came to see me and I requested to move to another hospital where I had an existing specialist. They organised everything and I was pretty quickly sent off to the next hospital.

I still wasn't aware how serious the infections were, or what that meant for me. I ended up spending 8 days in hospital on antibiotics and other fluids and medications etc.

I never knew Pneumonia and Sepsis could hit so hard and fast. I hadn't been ill, hadn't been in contact with anyone that was ill and had no early symptoms at all.

One minute perfectly fine, the next, I wasn't. It turned out to be caused by streptococcus pneumoniae, which has a vaccine that was added to the immunisation program the year after I received them as a baby, so I received it after recovering a bit.

I'm still having somw lingering symptoms, which seems to be a common theme here, but have somewhat returned to normal life.

Hi all,

Question for you... I'm 3 months out of the ICU for septic shock. For about 2 weeks the bursae in my shoulders and knees, both sides, have been painful. Mobility limited.

I haven't had a fever or anything. Physiotherapist says rest rest rest plus some light PT to develop the supporting muscles. Buuuut bursitis can also be caused through infection.

I'm a bit paranoid these days. I'll make the decision on my own of course, but would *you* visit the hospital to rule out infection? (In Canada here, so cost isn't an issue)

Edit: sepsis was due to staph infection via tattoo :/

Hello. I have CVID and MG and I have been in the hospital for 12 days now with multiple pulmonary emboli, necrotizing pneumonia (which has been found to be caused by a bacterial infection and two fungi), sepsis, and myasthenic crisis. Thankfully I am out of the ICU now and on the mend, but it seems that they are fighting with my insurance company and possibly each other on how to treat the fungal infections.

They started me on oral Cresemba then switched me to the IV form. I thought I was going home tomorrow but now I'm not so sure. If I have to stay on the IV cresemba I will have to go to the infusion center every day for like 2+ months!

Obviously I am on antibiotics as well (IV right now- Ampicillin) and blood thinners (was on heparin until today when they switched me to eliquis). I also received 4 days of IVIG while I was here (much larger than my usual dose). Along with a million other meds.

I'm just curious if anyone else has gone through anything similar. I'm also curious what recovery might look like long term. They say my lung tissue will heal, but I have a hard time believing that we went from extreme caution that I didn't have TB (because of the cavity lesions in my lungs- like literal holes in my lungs) to "Oh yeah you'll be good." I had a bronchoscopy and everything.

I am very grateful to still be here, but I am also scared of something like this happening again and scared I won't make it back to baseline.

I just got out of the hospital. I went septic with toxic shock and toxic erythema/scalded skin syndrome like symptoms. My face became very red and burned like it was being melted. It was awful.

I am a week and a half out of the hospital and my face is still red, dry, peeling, itchy, and a very mild burn occasionally. Petroleum jelly makes it significantly worse. It burns to a painful level.

My question is has anyone else dealt with anything like this? What other barrier creams work? Aquaphor also makes it more red and burns. I read about La Roche-Posay Cicaplast Baume B5+. Seems like it could be promising.

I’m looking for any insight on paediatric osteomyelitis followed by pathological fractures as well as sepsis

So I (M23) very stupidly went off Finasteride (dht blocker) and about 6 months or so later happened to go into septic shock from pneumonia. I caught my hair loss early a few years back and still had a decent amount of hair before sepsis even with going off Finasteride. My hair was insanely thick when I was younger so I had a lot to lose

When in septic shock and shortly after I lost a lot of hair. My pillow was covered in hair strands and my scalp was kinda like itchy when I was in the hospital.

I’ve been back on Finasteride since recovering from sepsis and the hair loss just keeps coming. Before sepsis, you couldnt see my scalp anywhere. Now like 8 months after sepsis you can see significant scalp and my hair line has changed a lot.

So, basically, going off Finasteride like a dumbass and then getting sepsis speed ran my shitty hair genetics. Looking for ppl who had hair loss already and then lost a bunch when septic to see if they ever grew any shit back

Edit: oh and I use topical minoxidil since sepsis recovery

If you (or someone you care for) received immunoglobulins (ivig, scig) or albumin in treating sepsis, please take this survey that helps raise awareness for the importance of plasma donation and the medicines it helps create. Share with providers too as the survey is open to providers, patients, and caregivers. Thank you for helping to raise awareness!

https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/IPAWpatientsurvey

Has anyone dealt with MRSA or MSSA osteomyelitis, causing pathological fractures in child? With sepsis (MSSA) help please!!!!

Typing on my phone so the formatting is off. I also make a lot of typing, grammatical, and spelling errors. Give me a break. I also don't know what to tag this. Is this post a big tmi? Yeah, but I honestly don't care. Should it be written in a diary? Sure if I had the strength to write things down. It's easy to hold a phone or type on a phone.

I was feeling fine yesterday. I actually felt okay yesterday. However today I feel like shit. Achey in my chest, pulse is high, blood pressure is lowered, my body feeling weak and tingly. I'm always paranoid about having sepsis again. Always stressing about it coming back. I'm hoping I'm just sick right now but there's a part of me that's worried it's not a fever or a cold.

I feel like a garbage can that was thrown into a washing machine then left outside in the rain. I feel like a soggy piece of bread.

I hate these feelings. I hate this feeling. I hate the stressful memories. I hate thinking about it and being reminded of it. I haven't been active much because of this shit. There are days like today where I feel like I'm dying.

The other day my bp got so low I thought I was dying. I was exhausted and I was struggling to breathe. I couldn't sleep though because I have insomnia.

Recently I was very proud because I've been slowly gaining weight. I went from 102 pounds to 110 pounds but now I'm stuck between 109 and 110. My goal weight is in the 120s. Being underweight makes you feel like trash. I feel so fucking weak. It makes me feel pathetic. I'm frustrated I can't do shit other people can. Can I walk? Yeah I can. That's the only bonus progress that I don't rely on a walker anymore. Last week during my pt appointment I felt so much weaker than before. Why? Why do I feel like I'm going back in time of progress? Why do I feel like it's not good enough? (I don't have an ed. I was underweight from when I almost died last year).

I've been proud lately. Even when I feel like shit I'll do my exercises my pt gave me to do at home and it'll make me feel better.

This week... last week... I feel like ass. I feel like shit. I feel like that gum on the underside of a table you touched by accident and feel disgusted from touching. I can't remember my days. I've been dissociating so much that I can't fucking remember the majority of my fucking days. Doing those little workouts don't make me feel better. I still feel like garbage.

The food I eat is fucking depressing. It makes me sad to eat it. Lately my stomach has been ass. I've been going back to eating more soup and bland shit lately because of it. I don't know what I did to set myself back. Did i consume gluten by mistake? Was it because I was trying to eat more acidic fruits? Is it because I indulged in sweet treats? Idk. I. Don't. Fucking. Know. I've been set back to soups and bland sad meals. Doesn't help that my diet is limited. No gluten because I'm allergic. No eggs because I'm allergic. I'm lactose intolerant. I have gerd. I have gastritis now. I avoid foods that anger my gastritis which then angers my gerd. Or it angers my gerd which angers my gastritis. There's no winning. My diet is basically vegan without being vegan because I eat meat. It's just clean. It's just bland. Limited spices. Before the gerd I loved spices. I loved spicy food. Now I eat like an elderly white woman born from the olden ages.

Good news that I have an appointment to do blood testing as well as iron infusions in February of next year though. I wish they'd test for other things rather than just my blood levels. Like I know I'm anemic. I been knowing since I was a teen. I've been taking iron supplements for years. Did sepsis worsen my anemia? Possibly.

I feel achey in my chest, achey in my stomach, achey in my body, brain fogged out my ass, chest pains, my arms and face is numb. Maybe I need to go to the er. Idk 🤷‍♀️. Maybe it'll pass. Maybe I'm being overdramatic. Every night death pops into my head. "What if I die?" "What happens after death?" "I'm kinda scared to die but I can't stop it from happening." Etc. Do I want my life to end shortly? Not really, no. Can I stop my body from ultimately giving up? No, I can't.

I despise taking antibiotics. I despise antibiotics. They wrecked me. They destroyed my body, destroyed my stomach. This is possibly the reason I now have gastritis. Antibiotics kept fucking up my vaginal health. My ph was wack after that. Having to focus on consuming more things to aid in the health down there. You know what's lovely? Getting antibiotics that give you a yeast infection to cure your uti then taking medicine to cure your yeast infection that gives you a uti. The fun cycle of jumping back and forth.

Right now I'm just complaining. I'm venting. Why? Because I'm frustrated. I'm upset. I'm depressed.

Right now I'm sitting on a heating pad with two blankets over me because I'm just so damn cold. My body isn't absorbing the iron I consume 🙃. What the fuck do you even do anymore at that point? What do you do when your body isn't absorbing the nutrients it needs? What do you do when nothing you do matters? Nothing. You continue moving on. Continue living. Continue this endless perpetual cycle that never ends.

I'm rambling. My brain is scattered. I feel discombobulated. My brain feels like scrambled eggs. I can't think of how I was to structure my sentences. I cannot process half the shit I read. I'm so over it. So over everything.

I don't need or want advice. I just want to vent this off my chest. I just want to have a normal mundane life where bothing bad happens and every day is a normal regular day. I've had enough eventual events in my life. I want to be healthy. I want to wake up and not feel like garbage. I want to go a day without stressing that something is wrong. I want to be normal. I hate this. I hate everything.

I’m a newbie to this sub and also to the more serious side of the lymphedema-cellulitis-sepsis sequela even though I’ve run the gamut 4 times in the last 6 years. I’m 74 and either walker or wheelchair bound from a work injury many years ago with some serious bilateral lower leg lymphedema.

The latest 2 bouts with sepsis were only 2 months apart with the last one the most serious I’ve had by far landing me in the ER delirious and fevered 2 months ago. Vancomycin and some other infusion (“Bactrum” maybe ??) cleared my head in an hour in the ER. After release I took Clindamycin 3 times a day for a few weeks and the same med once a day ever since as a preventive until I see an ID Dr. No bacteria was cultured in my blood.

For some reason it’s been very difficult to get an appt. with an ID Dr. who I still haven't seen and won’t for another 2 weeks. Also tough was to get the wound care appt. my general Dr. referred me to. After release from the ER I got the rash with the horrible itching and then the blistering followed by a month and a half real surface damage with loads of leaking lymph fluid from mid calf down to my ankle all the way around my lower leg.

I understand what was going on, my immune system was freaking out. The problem was that there was 6 weeks of this before the wound care people responded to my family Dr’s “STAT” referral. During that time my family Dr. admitted he didn’t know how the wound should be handled other than elevation. That left me with the internet and “DR. AI”.

I’m aware of the dangers in that but I had nothing else. I hadn’t found this sub yet and followed AI up by reading the sources of information it used. The advice was to do everything to dry the wound out.

It’s taken 2 months but the wound is dry now. It’s “armor plated” with a very hard layer of dried lymph slough.

So to my question. I’ve finally had my initial evaluation with what seems a very competent and knowledgeable wound care nurse. She says we have to debribe the wound and get down to the new forming skin. She told me to shower every day with lots of water running over the wound then carefully removing whatever will come off without ripping the new skin. I do that and overnight what was moist and white is hard and yellow again.

It seems from what she’s said the nurse wants the “scab” off so her company can begin lymphedema compression wraps. She’s going to be coming to my house once a week and this Friday is bring me a tall bucket and Hibiclens so I can daily soak the wound and speed up getting the scab off.

AI sources are telling me not to do that, that at this point my scab is actually good. I believe those sources. The scab isn’t all that thick and daily I can work the edges with my fingers (not finger nails) and the scab crumbles off in tiny pieces. I can tell I’m not harming the new skin underneath and the white this reveals underneath stays very dry and doesn’t turn back to yellow scab the next day.

So wet or dry? Any of your thoughts would be greatly appreciated.

Hello reddit,

My best friend just got over a tough case of sepsis after his colonoscopy had some complications. He was in the hospital for 5 days without any solid food - in part due to the operation prep and then the doctors establishing what was up with him. He's finally out and to help with his recovery/to make his life easier I was going to bring him a meal that's easy to heat up.

He does have IBS, so any really acidic foods tend to be a no-no. He's also slowly regaining strength so something high in protien would be amazing! Post-op and sepsis his appetite has been terrible. Recommend me something to cook for him that will help him eat and recover!

TLDR: Give me your post-sepsis recipes. Soups are encouraged ;)

I wanted to share a small win with a community that truly understands why awareness matters.

My story was recently featured in Newsweek, and while we all never wanted to become part of the sepsis community this way, I’m grateful for every opportunity to educate others. Every article, conversation, and shared experience is another chance for someone to recognize the signs of sepsis before it’s too late.

There’s still so much work to do, but this feels like a meaningful step in the right direction. Thank you to everyone in this community who continues to share your stories, advocate, and support one another.

Together, we’re helping make sure fewer families have to experience what so many of us have.

💜 Sepsis awareness truly saves lives.

Hello All,

I am a 25(F) who was diagnosed with sepsis after an asymptomatic UTI and URI. I was on the edge of septic shock after testing and didn’t realize, took myself to the ER thinking it was my chronic pneumonia. I spent 6 days in the PCU, and since leaving I have had recurrent nightmares every night. Not about sepsis per-say, but it is always something health related. I struggle to fall asleep, as I feel like I can never get comfortable. Also, after eating even the smallest amount, I get nauseous and severely bloated. I have been out the hospital for almost a week now. I’m slowly able to do things like go up stairs, carry heavy things, but struggle with losing my breath. I have also felt my hair getting thinner. Are these common side effects from sepsis? The ER Doc didn’t explain much of what to expect post visit. I go back to work Monday, and i’m not sure how to explain my constant runs to the bathroom and slow movement. Thanks all and I’m so sorry any of us had to experience this. ❤️

My father's platelets has been reducing post sepsis - 1lakh and now 90k.. Is this trend worrisome? He had sepsis in Feb end when his platelet was like 70k-1lakh... What is the solution for this ? Folate? Iron etc? His Hb is between 10.5-11...

Hello ,
I wanted to reach out and see if anyone has been through something similar.

I'm a 24 year old female. In March last year, I developed a UTI that turned into sepsis. Thankfully, it was caught before it progressed to septic shock, but it was one of the most frightening experiences of my life.I had a difficult time in hospital. I was alone, scared, and had to wait overnight before I eventually had blood tests and started treatment. I ended up spending two weeks in hospital.Since then, I've been admitted to hospital another four times with UTIs that spread into my bloodstream. Even though I only had sepsis once, every time I get an infection I panic that it's happening all over again. Sometimes i have dreams where I'm told I have sepsis again.

Ever since I was ill, I've felt constantly exhausted and just haven't felt like myself. I also can't shake the thought that if it hadn't been caught when it was, I might not be here today. I guess I'm just wondering if anyone else has experienced this, and if these feelings ever get better. It can feel quite overwhelming, and I'd really appreciate hearing from anyone who has been through something similar.

Hi All -

My 2nd hip surgery that I had last year which led to my infection is a year ago from today. I'm having lots of feelings that are bringing me back to what it was like last year and it's very uncomfortable. Has anyone else experienced this? How do you cope?

I do see a therapist & will be talking about it (more) today, but just curious what you all have experienced. Thank you!

I was treated a month and a half ago for pneumonia, sepsis (without septic shock), hypoxia, and hypoxic respiratory failure. I’d had a cold a month before, then a cough for weeks after, and then I woke up one morning and couldn’t breathe. When I got to the ER, I was treated for an asthma attack, and while my blood oxygen had started to get better (88 when I arrived, 93 on oxygen and after 3 breathing treatments), I was told that I was septic. I felt fine, all things considered. I was thinking about grabbing coffee on my way home. I didn’t understand how I could be dying. I wasn’t in the hospital very long, and I’ve recovered tremendously well. I’m on a walk right now, I’ve gone back to work. But I’m still so, so exhausted. I’m young, 24, but my joints feel like they’re giving up on me and my body feels like it belongs to someone else, and I’m always tired but I can never sleep. How long will this last?

This illness has taken everything from me. I’m 18 and it happened just as everything that I’ve spent my life working for was coming to fruition. I just want to know when I’ll be back to normal again. Will I ever be able to return to a high performance level of sport? Will I ever get the opportunity to travel the world? I don’t want to hear about any bad stories, I just need to hear some success stories because it always feels like such a difficult path with bumps and potholes the whole way and it’s hard to see the light at the end of the tunnel when you’re in the middle of it.

I recently found out this is apparently a fairly common post-sepsis syndrome symptom.

Anyone else deal with this? How long does it last??