Gone Too Soon

 

With heavy hearts, we share that our beloved sister-in-law, Catherine Joy Sabino Abraham, 33, passed away on Tuesday, April 12th, due to a blood clot in her brain, after being hospitalized since October 2021. It all began with a toothache and quickly evolved into a medical nightmare requiring more than 40 surgeries and procedures in less than six months. After overcoming so much, Joy’s body finally seemed to be healing, and she was just days away from being able to return home to her family when things unexpectedly took a turn for the worse. Joy fell into a coma and was called home to Heaven two days after brain surgery to remove the blood clot. (For more details about what happened to Joy, please scroll down to the section titled "A Long Journey".)

 

Your thoughts, prayers, and generosity are appreciated during this difficult time. Please know that all funds raised here will directly support our brother and their children, Hannah (12) and Caiden (10). Your donations will help pay for Joy’s funeral expenses and any medical bills not covered by insurance. Anything above and beyond those immediate needs will be placed in college fund accounts for both children. We are so grateful for those who have already reached out to ask how you can help. Please feel free to share this page with people you know who may be interested in supporting the Abraham family during this difficult time.

 

 

About Joy

 

Joy was born on September 7, 1988, the middle child of 5. She and Mervyn met while he was vacationing in the Philippines in 2007. She moved to the United States in 2010, married Mervyn later that year, and they were blessed with two children, Hannah and Caiden.

 

Despite financial and personal challenges, Joy pursued her goals with determination. She worked as a nurse (LVN), sometimes holding two jobs while attending school to become an RN (registered nurse). Those close to her know just how hard-working she was, driven by the desire to help people and give her children the best life she could offer them.

 

As a Christian, Joy’s faith was of utmost importance to her, and she strove to set a solid faith-based foundation for her children. As a wife, mother, sister, co-worker, and friend to many, her kindness, persistence, and love will never be forgotten. Joy loved to travel (Lake Tahoe was one of her favorite places to visit), and she loved to dine at her favorite restaurants with her family and friends (her favorite food was Korean BBQ.)

 

When she was born, her mother gave her the middle name “Joy” because she was such a happy baby. That same cheerful disposition would define the rest of her days; even during the most challenging times in the hospital, she seemed to exude a level of positivity and peace that many people only dream of experiencing.

 

 

A Long Journey

 

We have provided an extensive summary below if you would like to understand exactly what happened to Joy (or, as some of you know her, “Cath”). Thank you in advance for taking the time to read it.

 

In mid-October 2021, Joy experienced a toothache combined with a high fever, leading to an ER visit. After being given antibiotics, pain medication, and IV fluid at the ER, she was diagnosed with bowel inflammation and sent home that day. However, severe vomiting continued that evening and she returned to the ER, eventually being admitted to St. John’s Hospital in Oxnard, where the doctors diagnosed her with sepsis. (This potentially life-threatening condition occurs when the body's response to an infection damages its own tissues, causing the body’s organs to function poorly and abnormally.)

 

Joy stayed at St. John’s Hospital for the next four nights as doctors worked to determine what kind of infection she had (bacterial, viral, or fungal). During this time, her health quickly worsened as she experienced fluid overload, tachycardia, pneumonia, heart failure, and cardiac arrest. They were able to revive her, placing her on an Impella device (which is used for severe heart failure.) She was airlifted during the night of October 25, 2021, to Cedars-Sinai Medical Center because St. John’s Hospital didn’t have the proper equipment to support her heart.

 

By the time they arrived at Cedars-Sinai, all of Joy’s major organs had failed. As a result, she couldn’t communicate in any way or even open her eyes (although she was able to hear.) To keep her alive, the medical team hooked her up to several machines, including a respiratory device called an ECMO machine, which is used to pump oxygen (via a tube through the windpipe) down into the lungs. The ECMO process essentially functions as the heart and lungs outside the body; it’s considered the highest level of life support. This would mark the beginning of Joy’s journey with multiple emergency surgeries and procedures (42 in total.)

 

Early in the morning on October 26th, due to the excess fluid and pressure, they had to do a groin incision and drainage procedure and open up her stomach to try and find the cause of the problems that all the medical testing couldn’t diagnose. The following day, a leg fasciotomy was performed to relieve the pressure in her legs, and she was also put on dialysis 24/7 (to save her failing kidneys.)

 

Within a week, she needed an abdomen washout, removal of blood clots in her legs and femoral artery, and removal of dead tissue in her lower legs. Around this time, Mervyn felt Joy, who still couldn’t open her eyes or communicate verbally, squeeze his hand occasionally between her various procedures. The slightest squeeze filled him and our entire family with the greatest hopes.

 

Unfortunately, on November 10th, two weeks after the initial leg fasciotomy, both of her legs required amputation (her left leg above the knee, and her right leg below the knee.) The weeks that followed were not void of challenges, as she needed more incisions for drainage and skin grafting. Due to acute liver failure, she was bleeding incessantly during all these procedures and required a significant blood transfusion and a miracle to survive.

 

Joy began to speak a little when her nasogastric (feeding) tubes were finally removed around mid-November. She was also able to open her eyes again around this time. Even though she needed a second amputation on her left leg on December 4th (they had to remove the entire leg up to her hip), her body was healing and recovering well enough that she was released from the ICU to a lower level of care. It truly seemed promising, but she developed yet another infection about a week later and was sent back to ICU. Fearing possible compartment syndrome in her abdominal area, they opened her up again to remove abscess fluid from her pancreas and abdomen. (Compartment syndrome is a painful and dangerous condition caused by pressure buildup from internal bleeding or swelling of tissues.) In addition, her gallbladder was also removed to prevent further infection. She was intubated again and placed on a tracheostomy tube to support her breathing.

 

Finally, on February 10th, Joy was released from Cedars-Sinai and transferred to Northridge Hospital Medical Center for rehabilitation. She was so relieved to transfer out of Cedars-Sinai and move on to the next stage of her recovery. Our family was filled with hope as we saw her make huge strides in progress. (At this time, she still had fungal pneumonia.)

 

On April 5th, Joy complained of another toothache. The following day, she developed a fever and couldn’t keep any food down. She and her family requested to get her transferred back to Cedars-Sinai, but the request was denied. According to Cedars-Sinai, Northridge Hospital Medical Center was fully equipped to treat her. A few days later, her symptoms worsened with increased troponin levels and slightly elevated levels for her liver and kidneys. On April 9th, Joy developed left-sided weakness, unable to move or even feel her left arm. She verbalized this issue to Mervyn, who immediately informed the nurse.

 

An MRI revealed severe bleeding on the right side of her brain, and she underwent emergency surgery on April 10th to get the blood clot removed. Unfortunately, this surgery caused Joy to fall into a coma, and in the morning hours of April 12th, the doctors pronounced her brain dead. Words cannot express the pain our hearts felt in this moment and still feel now. The medical team allowed our family to say our last goodbyes. At 7:41 pm on Tuesday, April 12th, our beloved angel, Catherine Joy, began her eternal life in Heaven.