Little Jeremiah of Indianapolis had a high fever and suddenly went into septic shock last month.
Within just days, a 2-year-old boy from Indianapolis went from being a healthy and happy tot to battling a mysterious illness that cost him all four limbs.
Little Jeremiah is recovering and being rehabilitated at the pediatric ICU at Riley Hospital for Children following a quadruple amputation of his arms and legs.
None of his three siblings, including a younger sister that was born while he was hospitalized, have yet learned about his amputations.
“Letting the Lord in my life, in her life, and our kids’ lives now, it made us stronger to fight this battle, it made us so much stronger and I'm thankful," his dad Nicholas Thompson told Fox 59. “He can do anything in his lifetime. This might stop him now, but I think the future can be bright for him.”
His mom, Ashley Cox, recalled just last month when her 2-year-old son was healthy, running and playing in the playground. Just days later, she said, Jeremiah came down with a high fever.
"It was the fever of 104, that's when I knew something was wrong," Cox told Fox 59.
She said everything happened really fast, and by the time she took her son to the hospital, the mysterious illness had already taken over.
“My son's covered now from head to toe in these purple like … it wasn't little dots now, it was big ol' blotches that was just taking over,” Cox said. “It was scary.”
Jeremiah was in septic shock by the time he arrived at the hospital, for which doctors immediately administered antibiotics.
“[With] septic shock, really we talk about the golden hour,” Dr. Alyson Baker explained. “One hour from the time you get sick to get those antibiotics in so that you need fewer things down the road.”
The antibiotics worked and healed Jeremiah of the mysterious illness. Doctors were unable to diagnose what might have occurred since the medicine worked so quickly.
However, the illness did have a chance to cause long-term damage to the 2-year-old. It had cut off circulation to his limbs and doctors said the only option to ensure Jeremiah would survive was to amputate.
“You can't continue to have portions of your body attached to you that are no longer alive,” Baker said. “That's just a huge risk for an infection.”
While it is still unclear when Jeremiah will be able to leave the hospital, friends and family are confident he will be able to start learning to crawl and walk using prosthetics soon, according to his GoFundMe page.
“He is doing a lot better than he was, and the family is hopeful,” the post read. “They have a long road ahead of them, and life doesn’t just pause when a tragedy happens.”
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