Assist Tawny's Family Through This Difficult Time

Hello everyone, our family isn’t one to ask for help however I feel we don’t have other options at this time. We have suffered the loss of my younger sister Tawny. If you know our family, you know Tawny. She was one of a kind, full of love and a fighter. She has fought hard for 16 years with many obstacles. At this time my mother has not worked in 16+ days as she was her caregiver full time and does real estate on the side. At this time she is unable to focus on real estate and as anyone knows you do not get paid by the hour. She will be looking for a more stable full time position in the near future. With that being said she needs time to focus on her grief of losing her child and all the things that come with that. My mom has cremation cost or funeral costs as well as household bills she needs help with in order to not fall anymore behind. Down below will be the short version of what we went through that lead up to her passing on January 8th. If you can help her, we would be grateful for any amount or if you can share our post. Thank you for everyone who loved her and who has taken the time to read this.

In the early morning of 12/22 Tawny woke up throwing up in her sleep as well as having a very high heart rate. My mom called an ambulance and she was taken to Sutter Roseville ICU where she was then treated for pneumonia and sepsis which turned into septic shock. This quickly became very serious and they decided she needed to be placed on a ventilator in order to have a fighting chance.

Once she was “stable” enough she was transferred on 12/24 to Sutter pediatrics ICU in Sacramento where she would have the best chance because their specialty is children. They ran many tests because her infection levels were still rising. She was found to have Pseudomonas. This infection is very strong and is resistant to antibiotics. It was attacking her lungs. At this point the infection was so strong and resistant that they had tried multiple different antibiotics. Eventually her level of infection started to come down but due to the ventilator and infection, her lungs were very weak and partially collapsed.

The week of Jan 5 the doctors felt at this point her being on the ventilator for as long as she had that it was starting to causing issues. It was a double edge sword because she was unable to breathe on her own without it but it is also causing more damage. They had previously tried to take her off the ventilator in which she failed immediately and had to be placed back on in an emergency. They decided again 1/8 that they needed to get her off the machine. At 2pm they took the tube out and immediately put her on a biPAP machine which is a non invasive assisted breathing machine. During that time she was comfortable and we thought she was doing well since she was initiating some of the breaths. The plan at this point was to let her be on that machine for 24 hours to rest and hopefully be able to breathe on her own. She was partially sedated. They did a blood test at 3pm to check the carbon dioxide levels in her blood which is an indication of her breathing or not breathing on her own. Her levels were high but not ridiculously bad. I left around 4:20 to head home. I got a call around 4:30 from my mom that the doctor came in again after testing her blood levels for a second time and her carbon dioxide levels had gone up to a not survivable level and that she would have to live the rest of her life on life support. Her mom and dad made the choice that they would let it be her decision if she wanted to keep fighting or not. They did not want to keep her on life support for their own satisfaction of keeping her alive as that’s not a great quality life. Around 5:15pm they unhooked everything, took her sticky’s off so she was comfortable and looked like herself. Then we took her off the machine and she made her choice, she slowly and peacefully took her last breaths with her family by her side. She looked like a beautiful angel and at 6:07pm she became one.

Tawnys parents have decided to donate her eyes and her heart to help other children in need and in a sense live on.