Prayers for Anita

This is what has happened to our sweet 13 year old girl…

The week before Christmas Anita was showing signs of having allergies. Mom was giving her medication. Overall, she seemed fine. On Christmas Eve she was eating and acting normal. Everything seemed OK. On Christmas day she began to have fatigue and dizziness. That evening, her her foot, elbow and wrist began to show signs of redness, or irritation. We decided to take her to the hospital the following day. When she was admitted into Tennova the medical professionals began to run tests on her. They were unable to determine the cause of her symptoms. However, they knew she was very very sick. With this in mind, they sent us to TC Thompsons in Chattanooga. She rode in an ambulance, and once she arrived, she flat lined. Her heart stopped. Her blood pressure bottomed out. Immediately, medical professionals intubated her so she could breathe. It was prioritized to get her heart rate and blood pressure back to a stable condition. She was put into an induced coma, because her body was fighting itself. She was in septic shock. They begin giving her massive doses of blood pressure medication to stabilize her blood pressure. Because there were such large doses of blood pressure medication, her body began to protect the internal organs that were most vital in doing so the blood pressure medication push fluid throughout, her extremities resulting in the restriction of blood flow. Then the bacteria from the septic shock took over her body quickly, and her limbs began to fail. Surgeons were wanting to make an incision to release the pressure on her extremities. However, her blood pressure and other vitals were not stable enough and she would not have made it if they were to do so. The choice was made to focus on saving her life versus her extremities. The next day she was stable enough for the orthopedic surgeon to go in and make three incisions on the right arm left arm left leg and two incisions on both feet. They attach the wound vac systems, to suck out the excess fluids in her extremities. This was to allow blood flow however, for some of the extremities it was already too late. They placed her on a dialysis machine before surgery to help take place of her kidney function that was failing. This was also an attempt to promote blood circulation throughout her extremities.

The next several hours were focused on keeping her body stable and pulling the fluids out of her extremities. We were hit with a ton of information and unsure of what the next step would be...

2 weeks later

They found out what she had. Somehow Strep Group A got into her bloodstream. This could have happened anywhere and to anyone. The medical professionals said that she could have had a pimple or maybe a small scratch and the strep got into her blood. A kid a school could have forgotten to wash their hands and touch that open spot on her. We have no idea how this happened. She also has FLU type B. The combination of these two put her body into septic shock and ultimately shut down her body.

She ended up having both legs removed. Her right leg is amputated about 4-5 inches below the knee and her left leg is amputated right at the kneecap. She still has both arms, but she had to have a lot taken out of them. She lost around 1/3 of her muscles and tissues in both arms. All of the skin on her extremities has been destroy by the infection. Her kidneys are still not functioning, she is on intermittent dialysis to try and jump-start her kidney as well as filter her blood. She is in a better position than before. However, she needs to get her skin graphs ASAP. She does not have enough viable skin on her body to do this. The only option we have is to go through skin cell growth therapy. We have been reaching out to many organizations to get this process started. We still have a long way to go and many more expenses to pay. We are hoping that through this GoFundMe we can raise enough money for Anita's medical expenses and prosthetics. We thank everyone for their support. If you want to follow Anita's story, we have a Facebook group called Prayers For Anita. We update you daily on her condition! I'll link it below

Prayers for Anita Facebook Group