A girl who endured a horrific assault on her backside from a flesh-eating bug says she’s “lucky to be alive”.
Tracy De Jongh Eglin was rendered terrified when the micro organism made its mark, carving a 20cm deep wound that left her behind wanting like “a peach with a huge bite out of it”.
On January 20 the 59-year-old, who’s at present recovering from the ordeal, began to show flu-like signs that worsened over the next 5 days.
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(Image: Tracy De Jongh Eglin / SWNS)
Worryingly, the girl from Fife, Scotland, who now lives within the Netherlands, went into septic shock and collapsed, prompting the necessity to rush her to hospital. Upon investigation, medics found an enormous black mass on her left buttock, diagnosing her with necrotising fasciitis — a life-threatening bacterial an infection.
The mum-of-two was informed she had only a 10% likelihood of survival and spent 9 days in a coma, present process three surgical procedures. Thankfully she pulled by means of, remaining in hospital for 3 months earlier than shifting right into a rehabilitation centre after which returning house.
The former occasions supervisor defined: “My husband had to drive behind the ambulance, not knowing whether I’d come out of it alive. My family were told to prepare for the worst – they didn’t think I’d make it. The necrotising fasciitis had eaten the flesh on my left buttock, and it took three surgeries to remove all of the infected tissue and muscle.
“I spent 9 days in a coma, and after I lastly got here to, I used to be extremely disorientated and saved hallucinating. I woke as much as a catheter, a stoma, and a 20cm deep wound – it took two hours day-after-day for the nurses to vary my bandages and clear my wounds.
(Image: Tracy De Jongh Eglin / SWNS)
“It’s been so traumatic and changed my life forever. I’ve lost five stone and had to learn to walk again. Even now, I still can’t sit down, and have to take a special pillow out with me wherever I go. ‘My bottom looks like a peach that someone has taken a huge bite out of on one side.”
Tracy, who has needed to retire, went by means of three large surgical procedures, every of which lower away extra of her flesh and muscle to eliminate the micro organism. When she lastly awoke from the coma, she began to endure hallucinations and even forgot learn how to communicate Dutch.
Tracy stated: “I thought I was a teenager again – I forgot how to speak Dutch, and I was convinced that I was 17 and staying in a five-star hotel. I remember thinking that my dad – who passed away when I was 45 – had come to visit me, and he told me that it wasn’t time for me to join him yet.”
Tracy needed to exhibit unimaginable combating spirit after leaving hospital. She stated: “I was left completely broken and had to rebuild my life. I was so weak, my voice changed, and I had to learn how to walk again. Even now, I have to walk with a stick, and I still sometimes struggle to find the right words. The physical recovery has been incredibly painful, but mentally I’ve struggled the most. It’s been so traumatic – not just for me, but my family too.”
(Image: Tracy De Jongh Eglin / SWNS)
While the scenario is undeniably tough, Tracy is showcasing outstanding braveness and is specializing in the optimistic influence her ordeal has had on her relationship together with her household.
She concluded: “I am so grateful to be alive and to have the support of my amazing. The only good thing to come from all of this, is that I feel closer to my husband than ever before. It’s like we’ve fallen in love all over again – our relationship has improved immeasurably.
“Necrotising fasciitis is a dreadful sickness which has one intention, to destroy as a lot tissue as potential, thereby destroying lives. Listen to your physique and search medical consideration if a foul case of flu appears to show into one thing else. Without the short considering of my husband and the pace of the medical doctors and ambulance service, I’d not be right here.”
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