Lisa's Fight for Life

Due to my lack of social media presence on Facebook and other social outlets, letting life keep me too busy from reaching out and keeping up with my friends, I was unaware that one of my long time friends was battling for her life.

A week ago today, I did something extremely out of my normal routine. I woke up on a Monday morning and checked my Facebook feed. I know this doesn’t sound weird or uncommon to most, but for me, this is NOT what I do, ever.

But it was as if something was telling me to check, to scroll through, until I saw what I needed to see.

What I ended up seeing was beyond what I was prepared for. I saw a post from my friend sharing her horrific journey for the past month and not knowing what her future looked like. I saw a picture of a hand with bruises and holes in it from all the needles, due the surgeries, and her body breaking down. I saw a picture of my beautiful, strong friend looking weaker than I thought was possible for her. I saw a friend that needed my help.

Instead of the typical heart emoji or prayer sent her way, I immediately reached out to her mom to get her new number.

I knew this situation was beyond a heartfelt message, beyond a “like” or “love” on Facebook, this was a take action and see what can be done situation.

And that is exactly what I did.

You’re wondering how did I not have one of my best, long time, friend’s number? As I said before I haven’t been the best friend for a while. I have been the person to allow work to take precedence over everything and rely on the hope and belief that when I would remember to call, send a happy birthday message, that my friend Lisa would just answer and not skip a beat from the last year we had spoke. I was taking advantage of my friend’s continuous acceptance of my absence and not ever making me feel bad about my choices.

And do you know what happened when I immediately called my friend Lisa, who had already been in the hospital for a month, already had multiple surgeries, already had hundreds of needles poked into her body to try and find a medication that would stop her body from forming blood clots and already had to ask her parents to take her son with them to Florida because she didn’t know if the next day would be her last…….

My friend Lisa answered my phone call and said, “Hey Girl!!”

It was just that simple.

She didn’t judge me, she didn’t go into all the financial medical problems she was having, she didn’t make me feel bad, she just greeted me on the phone with the most love and excitement a friend would have for someone they love.

My friend Lisa just gave me the unconditional love and compassion she has always given. To friends, family and perfect strangers.

So I am reaching out to all of the same friends, family and perfect strangers to help my friend in a time she needs it most, please show her the love that she showed me and everyone she is around.

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LISA’S MEDICAL JOURNEY AND CURRENT STATE OF HOSPITALIZATION:

A week before Lisa went to the emergency room, she had started to notice her left leg was consistently hurting throughout the day. This persisted and so she went to a massage therapist thinking it was sciatic issues. Then, as she would do, she kept up with her shifts at work, working till 2am most nights.

As the week went by, the pain got worse, causing her to limp. Once her manager saw this, she insisted she go to the Emergency Clinic to have it looked at and not return to work till she had done so.

July 6, 2023 Lisa went to the Emergency Clinic as instructed and then was sent home stating she just had swollen lymph nodes and to keep her feet elevated.

The next morning, July 7th, her world changed drastically.

She woke up with her left leg swollen 4 times its normal size with the most excruciating pain she had ever felt.

She was rushed to the hospital and they immediately admitted her.

Once her tests came back, they found she had DVT (Deep vein thrombosis) and PE (pulmonary embolism).

They found an extensive blood clot in her left leg, but then found a piece broke off and dislodged into her lungs.

This normally being fatal, the doctors and nurses began prep for her first thrombectomy surgery and put a stent in her iliac vein to relieve pressure in her veins. However, this procedure was not effective, so they tried doing a thrombolysis procedures to try and break up the clots in her left leg.

Later she would have to endure several more thrombectomy and thrombolysis procedures; all of which had minimal positive results for her.

In the first surgery, they pulled out over 30 pieces of blood clots, some longer than a 12” ruler, and countless medium to small ones. The doctors said this was one of the most complicated blood clot situation they had seen.

After the second thrombectomy, they started to address a third issue she was having when admitted to the hospital. She was also suffering from excessive vaginal bleeding. Their only solution to help stop her pelvic bleeding was to put her on progesterone pills. However, the side effects of this medicine is to form blood clots. As you can understand, this did not help her main condition of DVT and PE.

During the weeks of surgeries she was having to be put on a blood thinner to help prevent more clots from forming.

She was first put on Heparin but then became allergic, which is HITT (Heparin Induced Thrombocytopenia- a life threatening condition). Then they switched her to Argatroban, a second blood thinner. However, with this medication they could never get her into a good therapeutic range; which if too high could start internal bleeding , but if too low, could form more blood clots. Lisa was then switched to Fondaparinux, but a clot then formed in her right leg.

After all of this was done with no real cure in sight, conversations of leg amputation were discussed or doing a Arteriovenous (AV) Fistula surgery. Either one would be a major surgery, with longer recovery times and still no guarantee of eliminating future clotting.

They decided to wait but do another procedure called an IVC filter placement; it’s placed in your abdomen via routing it through the neck and through the heart to catch any further clots that may lead to the lungs, heart or brain. All of which can be fatal.

The doctors and nurses still have no real solution but need her to do physical therapy to try and strengthen her veins and muscles in case they need to do any further surgeries, with the final one being a Arteriovenous Fistula.

Lisa has been out of work for 6 weeks, and is not sure how many more months before she can return.