Unfinished Resilience
If you’re reading this, our lives have intersected somehow, in some way, and you have some vision of who I am. Perhaps you know about my last year, or maybe you have no idea what’s been happening. I haven’t shared this story in full to date because it strips me of my protective (admittedly, perfectionist) outer shell, and exposes me during the most vulnerable year of my life. I haven’t been ready to let the words on this screen do the telling, but I’m now willing to try. This is a terribly difficult story to write, and my tale off this page is unfinished. It is traumatic, intimate, unsettling, and it is about an intensely personal part of a woman’s body. I don’t feel some higher purpose to share any of this, but I do feel the need to connect with, and explain to, the many of you who have expressed support over the last 365 days. I don’t intend to make anyone uncomfortable by sharing this account, and I actually don’t expect a single one of you to take the 10 minutes to read it. In the case that you do choose to spend your time here with me, I’m leaving my heart and story on this page. Bear with me.
I was the paradigm of an active thirty-something with a busy life and a full heart. I’d been shaped by my magical childhood in Hawaii, my tremendously meaningful educational pursuits, a sister who is my polar opposite but closest confidant, my invincibly inspiring father’s battle of Parkinson’s for 40+ years, and the epitome of a strong role-model mother who is the backbone of our family. Most of all, I lived with a contagious and vivid zest for all things positively fun, and an undeniable inability to refrain from giggles. Then, on February 23, 2018, my life was nearly lost, and indelibly changed.
When the searing pain in my left side began early on a Wednesday morning at work, my close colleague and friend was the first to tell me to quit being so strong and to go get help. I brushed it off, just a pulled muscle I told her. By that evening, I found myself hobbling into urgent care. The physician took one look at my inflated pelvis and inability to stand up straight, and sent me to the hospital for ultrasounds. Four hours later, as I sat shaking in the radiology reception area following several painful rounds of imaging, the radiologist and doctor told me they were confident it was a hemorrhagic cyst that would resolve itself. They told me to just pop some ibuprofen and I’d be fine; they said to give it a few days; they kept stating how normal cysts are in a women’s reproductive system. Naturally, I listened — not to my body, but to the doctors.
I spent the next 36 hours barely able to move. I could feel that with each passing hour my body was weakening, but I fought it every minute. My mother visited Thursday night, floored to see the condition I was in, and shocked I had been handling this alone. News flash, we all know “help” isn’t in my vocabulary. She left me that night, rattled, but I assured her I’d be fine, I’d get over this, I’m a tough cookie. Frankly, I know no other way to be.
By Friday morning, I knew something was terribly wrong. My body was unrecognizable and I felt barely present. I had not slept in 3 days, and tried to write off not being clear headed as simple exhaustion. It was the other factors that put me on edge: I was in so much pain I was unable to walk, my pelvis and abdomen had swollen to the point of severe and unrecognizable distention, making me appear 4 months pregnant; I had severe chills; I couldn’t see straight; I knew I had a fever but no clue what it was; I was intensely nauseous; and I was shaking so violently I could not hold anything. For the first time, I admitted I was scared, and I knew I needed medical attention beyond what I could handle myself. I asked for help.
I was quietly and quickly driven to the ER. I am forever grateful I made that call at that precise moment. Not long after, I would learn that if I had waited just 10 minutes longer, I would not be here to write these words. The stark realization has never lost its impact: I would have died in my apartment, trying to impossibly beat something that was killing me.
Admission through the ER was swift but terrifying. I was barely lucid but I heard the nurses state I was in tachycardia — an extremely low blood pressure and frighteningly high heart rate — and had a nearly 106 degree fever. None of it was registering, until they said I was in severe septic shock. I knew that meant it was bad, but I wasn’t able to piece anything together. I tried staying calm and present by counting the number of doctors and nurses in and out of the ER bay (it was 14) amidst having a blur of CT scans, ultrasounds, blood tests, physical exams, and receiving the concerned, sympathetic look of every healthcare professional within proximity. I can still hear one nurse say, as she drew my blood, that they were all so glad I came in when I did, that I’d saved my own life.
I remember feeling the sting of warm tears on my face and not registering that they were my own.
I remember feeling my mother holding my hand, trying to calm me, or maybe really, calm herself.
I remember a stranger dressed as a surgeon kneeling next to my bed and saying she was going to be right by my side today, that they needed to take me into major emergency surgery, and that they were going to try to fix this, but it needed to happen now.
I remember that same surgeon with the kind eyes and unflappable smile whispering to me they were going to do everything they could to save me, but I needed to tell my mother and anyone else I could, that I loved them. I wasn’t angry that she was being honest. I was shocked but thankful, because I now knew I was going into surgery to fight for my life. Nothing prepares you to hear that you’re dying. No one prepares you to hear that they’re not sure you can be saved.
I woke up in the ICU over 7 hours later, unable to move, in severe pain, attached to more tubes, IVs, and machines than I wanted to count, my throat raw from intubation, and I was completely confused. Trembling, I looked down to see my entire midsection bandaged. I could vaguely make out the sight of my mother at the room’s doorway. Seeing me stir awake, she motioned for the surgeon. They came to my bedside, and asked if I was ready to hear what happened. Truth is, you’re never ready to relive trauma. I nodded nonetheless:
I did not have a hemorrhagic cyst as originally diagnosed. I had a Tubo-Ovarian Abscess (TOA) that had grown large and contracted a serious infection since the urgent care and radiology visits just 36 hours before. There was nothing I could have done to prevent it, and I did nothing to cause it, it was freak and unusual; according to my surgeon, I had better chances of winning the lottery than having this happen to me. Moments after I arrived at the hospital, the TOA ruptured, spreading the dangerous sepsis infection throughout my entire system and into my bloodstream, putting me into deadly septic shock — my body was shutting down for good. Of the three levels of sepsis, septic shock is by far the worst, with the highest rate of mortality. The surgeons tried to address the TOA laparoscopically, but once the extent and severity of the situation was apparent with the TOA having been attached to my ovary and fallopian tube, they resorted to an emergency major procedure, resulting in a nearly 11in long surgical incision. It took hours to flush my system out and address as much of the septic shock as possible, and a salpingo-oophorectomy, the removal of one ovary and fallopian tube, to get me stable. I had less than a 15% chance of survival of that surgery.
None of this made sense as I heard my surgeon’s words fall out of her mouth. It was only when my sister sat at my bedside late that night, alone in the quiet ICU, and I looked at her with her eyes brimming with tears, and I said out loud for the first time that I couldn’t believe they took away pieces of me, that I was no longer whole. She then brushed my hair from my face, and stated plainly, “Stash, they had to take what was killing you.”
I was in the hospital for what felt like a lifetime, all the days and nights becoming one long, fluid time frame. I spent endless hours replaying the sequence of events, trying to parse out what had happened and why, and beginning the humbling and lonely process of recovery. Pieces of my life flittered in and out, and the people I needed made efforts to bring me normalcy: my sister showed me the ropes of daytime TV while curling my hair to make me feel somewhat lovely, while my brother-in-law helped my nephew arrange his stuffed animals he brought so I wouldn’t get lonely. My parents visited daily, taking to reading me the newspaper when I wasn’t strong enough to hold my eyes open to do it myself. My junior prom date from Hawaii, who now lived in Virginia, showed up after nearly 15 years of not seeing each other. My closest coworker and friend sent me daily anecdotes from the office, and reminded me that work would always be there, but to focus on myself for once. I was so touched that flower deliveries rolled in from near and far, so many that the nurses called my room “the greenhouse.” Two of my best friends visited me just 24-hours after I got out of surgery, and I don’t know if they fully understand to this day how much I needed that. As I sat a fraction of myself, in a blue hospital gown hanging across my foreign body, they simply grinned back at me. They found any way to put a smile on my face, looking at me as if I was the same girl they always knew and adored, because to them, I was. Human connection truly changes everything, and I cherish every genuine relationship I have.
I had always prided myself on being independent, and now I needed everyone that could help me do the basic things like bathing, being fed my liquid diet, changing my hospital gown, or even moving my leg positioning in the bed. I had to learn how to walk again, a frustrating and slow process for someone who pulled two-a-day workouts. My 3-year old nephew was at my side when I retook those frightful first steps gripping the IV poles and hallway handrails, and I couldn’t have asked for a better cheerleader.
I desperately wanted to feel my old life, to leap out of my hospital bed and gown, go for a run, have a full day at work, meet my friends for a barre class and then go for a drink out somewhere in the city. Accepting that your life has changed by no doing, choice, or means of your own is a hefty and difficult responsibility that you don’t ask to bear. What is more difficult, is accepting you almost didn’t have the opportunity to have a life at all.
The months following my first hospital discharge were exhausting. I had to figure out how to face all the people who knew me before this, and would know me after, but would never understand the in-between. It was the first night home that was the hardest, recognizing I was back in the surroundings I had left, now knowing I may have never come back. I was adamant I’d do recovery solo, living as I always had on my own, having no idea what challenges lay in front of me. I struggled with unbearable pain, complications, and what I now know is classified as PTSD from the trauma, but I never chose to wallow because I knew that would get me nowhere. I am forever committed to not wasting energy and time on things I can’t control, but remaining invested in being positive about the things I do control.
Four months to the day of my first emergency surgery I underwent a second surgery. I felt the same fear and anxiety as I lay in that hospital bed, not sure what would happen on the other side, but I also knew that I was where I needed to be. The surgeons needed to remove a mass of ovarian tissue attached to my uterus, and that propelled me into another round of recovery. During that surgery, they discovered the full extent of the damage of the septic shock and TOA rupture, and that yielded news hard to hear as a woman, about a future I hadn’t even built yet. It felt like the blows would just keep coming. Then, several weeks following my second surgery, after an evening of catching up over wine like we had done so many times before, a person very dear to me put a sweet hand to my face and said bluntly that they needed me to stick around for whatever was ahead. As simple as that moment was, it was pivotal for me because, so what, I’d had bad news, battle scars, and experiences no one my age should face — so what, because I was here, I was living, and I mattered regardless of what had happened. After both surgeries, my best friend spent weekends slowly and patiently walking the city with me as I got my bearings, a tedious and embarrassing activity, but she never opted out. Recovery is as much mental and emotional as it is physical. Uncomplicated and kind gestures, affection, giving time — these things are what we all need.
Since February 2018, I have made more ER/hospital visits than I can count with complications and ongoing issues; one of the nurses I’ve seen several times likes to joke I need a reserved parking space out front. In fact, about one-third of sepsis survivors are re-hospitalized within three months, and cases like mine of severe septic shock and major surgery may not afford a patient a lifespan longer than 1–3 years after discharge. Here I am a year out, not looking back. I’ve become accustomed to the rhythm and flow of the medical teams. I feel most safe and most settled in the hospital. There may not always be answers or good news, but there are people who know what to do for me. My road ahead is unclear. There are procedures and surgeries to be discussed, and pain to be tackled, but I won’t back down. I am exceptionally good at putting on a happy face and bearing my thick skin, but I have my moments. Everyday I look in the mirror and recognize I was minutes away from not standing there; everyday I acknowledge that I am here still fighting, but it doesn’t take away all that has shifted. Facing a life-altering experience changes you on many levels, and I am okay with that. The doctors all say the more space and time from trauma the easier it gets, and I don’t know that’s always true, I still grapple with it. After severe trauma, you feel like your life is on hold and everyone else is just going about their business, like nothing has happened. But, that is also the best reminder that you can get there, back to the mundane days, the routine normalcies, and the thrill of simple happiness.
Many of you showed up, emotionally and physically, when it was easier to back away. To each of you who has cared, whatever that looks like and whenever it was, thank you. I don’t have adequate means here to express the significance of feeling the support of people from across the world who made me feel valued. You have each chosen a way to make me feel your warmth and unrelenting love, and for that I am endlessly grateful. Whatever your struggle or story, live it. It doesn’t have to define you, but it can be part of who you are, and sometimes we need that adversity to show us how much more complex, dynamic, and powerful our lives are when we may not want to see it. Thank you to each of you who has stood by me on my best days and my worst, and for all the times I’ve heard you say you love me. I love you all back, with every ounce of me. I may have several fewer organs, but I am a whole lot more Stasia.
Unfinished Resilience
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