7 hours ago
2 
‘I feel like I’m dying.’
That’s the message I woke up to from my daughter, Sophia, one Wednesday morning in March 2023.
Normally I would have put such a text down to ‘teenage dramatics’, but on this occasion she was, terrifyingly, right on the money.
Looking back, Sophia’s symptoms began on the Monday evening.
She’d been to an evening training session with her lacrosse teammates and had been complaining about achy limbs.
Presuming she’d just overdone it, she took herself back to her hall of residence for dinner and bed.
On Tuesday morning, however, the vomiting started.
She messaged me to say she was being sick every half hour and at first I assumed it was norovirus. However, because she was three hours away at university in Manchester, I felt powerless to help her. All I could do was tell her to keep hydrated and keep messaging her to make sure she was okay.
Over the next 24 hours her aches, sickness and high temperature continued to worsen and, by the time she sent me that text on Wednesday morning, her symptoms had begun to progress into dizziness, confusion, a stiff neck, slight rash, and cold hands and feet.
I phoned her immediately, but all I could hear on the other end was silence followed by a weird moaning noise. Then my phone started pinging with messages that were just a jumble of letters.
That’s when I started to panic.
Switching to FaceTime, I just wanted to see that my little girl was okay. Instead, I was met with an image I will never forget: a blank staring face, a wide-open mouth and glazed over eyes.
I could tell that Sophia was in her room, alone, but as she was unable to move, speak or type coherently I wasn’t sure how I could help her.
We suggested Sophia try to type 999 to her flat WhatsApp group, alerting her flatmates that something was wrong. They got the message and came to her room to help her. We also contacted the halls’ security team who phoned for an ambulance.
I stayed on FaceTime and answered all of the paramedics questions on Sophia’s behalf. I felt totally helpless – interrupting with questions of my own seemed the wrong thing to do when the priority was getting to the bottom of what was happening.
After what seemed like a lifetime of tick boxes and checks, I heard the paramedic saying the words ‘heart attack’. I was shocked.
As soon as I heard that the ambulance had arrived, I grabbed a few things and jumped in the car for the long drive to Manchester.
By the time we arrived at the hospital Sophia had been diagnosed with sepsis, which doctors suspected had been caused by meningitis – the swelling of the protective membranes that surround the brain and spinal cord.
Meningitis symptoms
Symptoms of meningitis include:
A fever, cold hands and feet Vomiting A stiff neck A severe headache Intense muscle pain Confusion and irritability Drowsiness Pale, blotchy skin, or a rash that does not fade when a glass is rolled over it An aversion to bright lights SeizuresFind out more via Meningitis Now
They immediately put her on IV antibiotics as a precaution and moved her to intensive care, but because she was too ill to undergo the tests we didn’t get a formal diagnosis of bacterial meningococcal meningitis B (MenB) until 36 hours later.
Fortunately, as they’d put her on the correct antibiotics from admission, it saved her life.
She spent nine days in intensive care and the high dependency unit and a total of two weeks in hospital. However, there were some complications.
Sophia was left profoundly deaf in her right ear – a common problem for those who’ve had meningitis – she needed emergency surgery on her right hip for septic arthritis and also suffered from myopericarditis (an inflammation of the heart and surrounding structures).
But, she was alive, and to us that’s all that mattered.
When she left the hospital, doctors told us to expect at least a year of recovery. She continued with the antibiotics and endured numerous appointments with a variety of consultants, MRI scans and blood tests and spent a few weeks on bed rest.
After six weeks she was readmitted to hospital for another seven days due to a suspected bacterial infection and inflammation around her heart, meaning the recovery process started all over once again. She was devastated.
That June she had cochlear implant surgery to restore her hearing and thankfully, after a restful few months, she was given the all-clear on her heart. She could go back to playing sport and join in with university life.
Her return to university in September was nerve wracking for us all: she was excited to be with her friends again but apprehensive about getting ill and while I wanted her to be a normal teenager, I was terrified of more setbacks.
Other than an unexplained episode of heart attack-like symptoms after Christmas though, she has not had another incident since January 2024 and so she is now living an otherwise normal student life.
She spent the last year in Spain and Portugal as part of her Modern Languages degree, still takes part in sport and enjoys going out – although she knows her limits and rests when needed.
But it’s terrifying to think how close we came to the alternative.
Meningitis and septicaemia are life threatening medical emergencies that can take hold very quickly – one in six people with bacterial meningitis will die and many others are left with life changing after-effects such as limb loss, deafness, blindness or acquired brain injury.
In that regard, Sophia was lucky and we are so fortunate that she was able to answer my call that day.
But I want everyone to know the signs and symptoms of meningitis and sepsis and the importance of seeking early medical attention. Do not wait for a rash to appear, by the time one does blood poisoning has usually already developed.
I also want to encourage people to get the MenB vaccine. Currently only babies under the age of one can get it (and even then, that’s only been available on the NHS since 2015). Teenagers and young adults – who are most likely to contract MenB – meanwhile, must book and pay for it at most pharmacies.
I find this infuriating, especially as 9 out of 10 cases of meningococcal meningitis in the UK are caused by MenB. More must be done to raise awareness of this life threatening infection and vaccines should be offered as standard to our young people.
We can never give our children 100% protection – Sophia was vaccinated against the other types of meningococcal meningitis – but we can dramatically reduce their chances of contracting it.
Do you have a story you’d like to share? Get in touch by emailing [email protected].
Share your views in the comments below.
Bengali (Bangladesh) · 
English (United States) ·