Nurse lost three limbs after cough turned into sepsis
Now Jayne, 51, aims to raise £265k for new legs
A FORMER nurse who had three limbs amputated after a cough turned into sepsis has told how she ‘lost half her life’.
Jayne Carpenter, 51, needed operations to remove both her legs and an arm after being struck down by the deadly infection.
In the depths of despair, she told her husband Robert, 55, that he could leave her if he wanted to.
But after three years of hell in which she considered taking her life she is now hoping to raise £265,000 for new artificial legs. Mrs Carpenter, who has chosen to tell her story on World Sepsis Day today to increase awareness of the condition, said: ‘It’s been completely devastating and life-changing. It turned my world upside down. I haven’t let it defeat me but I do get my dark moments.
‘I told my husband, “You can walk away” and he replied, “I married you not for your arms or legs but because I love you”.’ Her illness began in April 2016 when she developed what she thought was a cough.
Mrs Carpenter, from Merthyr Tydfil, South Wales, said: ‘I’d had quite a bad cough and was coughing up darkcoloured phlegm. I was getting worse and I just thought it was a virus.
‘The following day I woke up and felt short of breath and couldn’t walk anywhere. As a nurse I thought it was something fairly trivial so didn’t want to make a fuss.’ Her GP advised her to go to A&E, but did not suspect that she had the early stages of sepsis.
She was initially told that she had pneumonia, but her condition quickly deteriorated and she entered a coma.
Mrs Carpenter spent nine weeks in hospital fighting for her life. Her husband was told she would die unless she had a triple amputation.
She lost four fingers on her right hand, her left arm below the elbow and both legs. Mrs Carpenter said the past three years had brought huge challenges for her. She added: ‘I’ve really struggled – I thought my life couldn’t improve beyond what it’s like at the moment. There were three points this year where I got close to ending my own life.
‘It’s been horrendous. It’s like a grieving process. I’ve grieved for the life I once had and the ability to do so many of the small things you take for granted such as being able to go for a swim. I can’t put my own jewellery on, I rely on my husband to put my shoes on. It takes away my femininity.
‘I try to do as much as I can but have to ask Robert to do lots of things. He’s been a real rock.’
Mrs Carpenter said coming to terms with the limits she now faces has been difficult. She has changed careers and works part-time as a paralegal at a solicitors’ practice.
She said: ‘People were saying, “You’re so lucky to be here”. We try to live as normally as possible but life is not always the same as before. I divide my life into two parts – before and after I got sepsis. I lost half my life.’
She is now raising £ 265,000 via GoFundMe for surgery which will see her receive state- of-the-art prosthetic legs. She said: ‘It will completely and utterly change my life without a shadow of a doubt. It’ll give me my freedom and independence back.
‘My life was stripped away and I just need to regain some of the normality that sepsis took away from me.’
Sepsis is responsible for more than 44,000 deaths every year in the UK, with five people dying every hour.
The Mail launched our End The Sepsis Scandal campaign in 2016 to raise awareness of symptoms among patients and medical staff in an attempt to reduce the number of missed cases.
You can donate to Mrs Carpenter’s appeal at www.gofundme.com/f/jclifewith nolimits
END THE SEPSIS SCANDAL