A mother of one is speaking out after her husband’s energy drink consumption nearly cost her family everything.
In a post shared on Endres Photography’s Facebook page, a woman named Brianna described the heart-wrenching battle that she and her husband Austin ended up having to fight while simultaneously preparing for the birth of their first child.
“Being pregnant is supposed to be one of the most amazing journeys you will ever embark on,” Brianna wrote. “You’re creating a new life. You are experiencing unconditional love for someone you have not even met. Austin and I were so excited to meet our little boy. To bring him home. To be a family.”
Amid her soon-to-be growing family’s bliss, Brianna said she received news from her mother-in-law that would leave her whole world “shattered within hours.”
“I still remember my mother in law waking me up that morning. ‘Austin had an accident’ she said. All I knew was that my husband was in the hospital. The worst part? I didn’t know why,” Brianna wrote.
“After a two hour drive to the hospital, I learned that my husband, the father of my child, the person I am so deeply in love with, had had a brain hemorrhage. Why? The doctors concluded (after running his tox screen and ruling out drugs) that this horrible event was due to his recent excessive energy drink consumption (a habit he had built when he started working longer hours and commuting).”
Before the family could process was happening, her husband was in an operating room undergoing a life-saving procedure.
“Surgery was already in motion… and after an agonizing 5 hour wait, we got to see him. But while everyone was focused on the almost unrecognizable face hooked up to all sorts of machines and tubes, all I could see was his parents. I saw the light leave his mother’s eyes as she saw her motionless son laying in that hospital bed. I saw his father break down crying as he held onto his wife. They didn’t know if the life they created together would even wake up. Watching this family- my new family, who I have grown to love and be a part of, be so shattered and broken…that is the worst feeling I have ever felt.”
The next day, Brianna said her husband was already undergoing his second round of brain surgery.
“Following this were strokes, seizures, swelling, and more things we weren’t prepared for,” she wrote. “There was a moment, sitting by his hospital bed, just praying he would be okay, that I knew I would never give up on him. No matter how messy our life would become. I was going to be by his side through all of it. After two weeks of living in a hospital, wondering if he would survive or be taken from us, we made our way back home. The time had come for me to deliver our baby.”
“I’m not going to lie to anyone, it was so hard. I had planned on Austin being a part of this huge moment,” Brianna continued in her emotional post. “Being by my side. Holding my hand. Being there to cut the cord. Being there to welcome our son into the world. It didn’t feel right… But a beautiful miracle happened as I delivered our son. Austin woke up.”
The new mom said that for about a week after her husband woke up, she was not even able to see him.
“I thought about him every day. I cried as I looked at my child who looked just like his daddy,” she wrote. “When the baby was only a week old, I left him with my in-laws. I knew I needed to see Austin.”
“I needed to tell him that our baby was here. To tell him how much we needed him. Weeks went by. We chased him all over the state as more operations and procedures were ordered. I saw him every chance I got. At a little over 2 months old, our son finally met his dad. A day I wasn’t sure I would ever see. That was the day that my heart gained some of its happiness back.”
But although Austin was finally able to return home to his loving family, Brianna said the struggle did not end there.
“Our life isn’t normal. There are doctors visits and hospital trips- so many that I loose count. But we are here. Fighting,” she wrote. “I wake up every day to take care of our beautiful little boy and my husband. I prepare the meals, do physical therapy, speech therapy, and occupational therapy. I help him with personal hygiene. I help him walk. I help him with every aspect of his life. And in between these tasks I take care of our very busy eight month old. It is hard, and I am tired, but we make the most of it. He isn’t the same man I fell in love with, but I still fall further everyday, We are fighting to help him recover. To make his life better. One day we will get there. Until then, I will never give up on him. Because love is selfless, and I love him more than life itself.”
Culled from: AOL.com
