Chani Matzen

April 16, 2016 I cancelled plans I had with my best friend due to feeling like I had a flu settling in. This was already odd since I don't even get a cold very often. I spent the day sleeping. Each time I woke up I was going back-and-forth between being freezing and sweating so much that I was drenching the shirts I was wearing. I did eat breakfast and dinner that day and kept all the food down. Sunday the 17th was pretty much the same, except that I had noticed that what I thought was an abscess or boil at the time started forming on my privates but toward the back. At this time I didn't think the abscess and my flu symptoms were connected. That evening I spoke with my supervisor at work and told her that I wouldn't be in the next morning. I told her that I didn't know what was wrong but I didn't feel well but I needed to go to the doctor, which I don't do often. The next morning Monday the 18th I went to a walk-in clinic. At this point the abscess was quite a bit larger than the day before when I had first noticed it. It went from the bottom of my bottom and along my left vaginal lip. The dr. At the clinic said that due to the location I was going to need to head to the ER and very likely consult an OBGYN. I went right over to the ER. The ER dr then looked at the abscessed area (I can't actually recall specifics. I was alone still at this point) But once they looked they said I would need an OBGYN consult. I was given an ekg meter for my heart, since at the time I was an untreated Diabetic, and told I was going to be admitted. Once I was in the room and settled an OBGYN came looked at the abscessed area and did some internal examining. He diagnosed me with cellulitis. He then said I would be there for 4-5 days with IV antibiotics. This was a bit overwhelming and I started to notify my parents and close friends. Since I was decided that no surgery would be needed I ate dinner around 5. Around 7:00 I was told that one of the hospital dr.'s working on my case had ordered a CT scan. They did the scan around 8:30. Sometime shortly after that I was told I was going in for surgery that evening and that I had necrotizing fasciitis. That my stay at the hospital would probably be about 4 weeks. There would be multiple surgeries to remove dead tissue and I would be getting IV antibiotics for awhile. So again I notified my parents Andy close friends. I went into surgery at 10 pm on April 18th. Since I had eaten they gave me something similar to an epidermal so I was awake for my first surgery, however I remember very little now. I had 4 others to remove dead tissue each of the following 4 days. I think it was the 3rd debridement that they hit live tissue and I woke in the worst pain of my entire life. The last surgery was 1 a week after the last to add more stitches. I had a total of 13 stitches, all down the left side of my vagina. There were 3 drains and a wound at the back that was being packed. I had dressing changes every 2-3 days after the surgeries were done. Initially requiring morphine to do. i had a morphine button for the first 7-10 days. I had IV antibiotics for 15 days. 3 different ones, vancomycin, Zosyn, and clyndomycin . The vancomycin only ran for 5-7 days. The other 2 for 15. I was in the hospital for 17 days total. I then had home care for 17 days.