‘I am a real family person,’ says 36-year-old Natalie Rushdie from London.
For two weeks at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic in May 2021, the professional jazz singer and mum to a seven-month-old faced a traumatic experience of sepsis alone in hospital, an experience that was to have lasting repercussions. She takes up her story here.
On the 22nd May 2021 I was on the fifth day of my COVID infection and I was feeling incredibly poorly. I was shivering, confused, fainting and was so ill that I was eventually blue-lighted to Charing Cross Hospital in London. I spent the day there on my own due to the COVID restrictions at the time. It was clear how overworked and under pressure the staff were but after several hours in A&E and numerous tests I was sent home again later that day.
My GP was fantastic, as were the staff at the COVID hub who were calling me every day to check on my COVID progress, however by the next day my oxygen levels were below 90% and I was so seriously ill that I had to blue-lighted again, back to the Charing Cross Hospital.
It’s hard to remember what happened over the next two weeks – everything just blurred together. But I know that at the time I felt like I was dying. I was given tests that day – 23rd May – and it wasn’t until the test results came back later on that day, that a nurse from the High Dependency Unit (HDU) said to me, ‘You’re obviously very sick’. She alerted a consultant and I was rushed into HDU where I stayed for the next 12 days.
I know that at the time I was shaking and confused but because of COVID restrictions I had no one with me to advocate on my behalf or to hear the diagnosis of sepsis. I had thought up until then that sepsis only happened in hospital and was something that happened to old people. I do remember feeling so ill – and the pain being so overwhelming – that I questioned whether I wanted to live. So, I suppose I actually felt relieved when I was diagnosed because I knew that there was a reason why I felt so unwell and relieved, naively, that I would now get treatment.
Obviously, I was by myself, so I can only imagine how my family felt when they found out. My husband Zafar must have been really worried, but he was suddenly at home on his own looking after our baby daughter Rose, who had only ever been breast-fed up to that point. He also had COVID and could not leave the house. To make matters worse there was also a shortage of milk formula in the UK. I am so grateful to all my mum friends who banded together to find all the milk formula in West London! My sister is a hospital consultant and I think she was possibly the only member of the family who actually realised how sick I was.
I was in hospital for 12 days after that – eight of them in the HDU on IV antibiotics and then the other four on a ward receiving oxygen, steroids, potassium, calcium, a nebuliser and also anti-sickness medication. I also took part in a drug trial because they were optimistic that it could help me get better.
Sepsis had affected my liver, kidneys, lungs and my blood clotting. When I came out of hospital it was a bit of a shock to me and my husband. Naively we just thought I would come home and that I would be like I was before. I know now that people say that it can take up to two years to recover from sepsis. In hindsight if I had known more about sepsis, I would have changed my expectations of the speed of my recovery.
When I first got back from hospital, I had help from my mum for about two weeks – I couldn’t have coped without her. Doing simple tasks such as having a shower was exhausting and even standing was a task as I had spent two weeks lying down. As time went on, I improved physically. However, it became clear that mentally it was going to take me longer to recover. I was suffering from PTSD, with symptoms such as flashbacks and disturbing nightmares, for which I went on to receive counselling. I also still have issues with regulating my body temperature, I suffer from fatigue and have problems with my stomach and digestion. But these days I’m eating more healthily and making a real effort to look after myself.
Four months after being discharged, I was trying to make sense of my experience and I made contact with the UK Sepsis Trust. This was very helpful in terms of getting advice from a support nurse and then attending a support group online where we discussed our experiences with sepsis. But in 2022, I was starting to think more about my mental recovery rather than physical recovery and I started to want to find out more about research and work that was being done to prevent what happened to me happening to others. I felt that I wanted to get involved in something that I could bring value to. That was when I heard about Sepsis Research FEAT and I started to follow them on social media.
Looking back, I feel that had I known about sepsis in the first place, I would have asked as soon as I arrived in hospital “Do I have sepsis?”
I also feel that if I had been educated about the recovery process, I would have been in a much better place physically and mentally. Which would have allowed me and my family to prepare for the long road ahead.
I really hope that by sharing my story it will help other people, but mostly simply encourage people just to ask…… Do I have Sepsis?
Sepsis Research FEAT would like to thank Natalie for sharing her story here and for very kindly giving her time and professional expertise to record a rendition of Auld Lang Syne for the charity in December 2022. The recording formed part of a special video produced in memory of 30 people – aged between 9 months and 90 years old – who have lost their lives to sepsis over the years. The video – which you can watch here – went on to become an integral part of the charity’s sepsis awareness campaign for Christmas 2022.
We are so grateful to Natalie for her generous support for Sepsis Research FEAT and its work.