A man has shared the shocking story of how what he initially thought was a minor burn on his thumb led to him losing both of his legs.
Max Armstrong, 40, spent six days in a coma after a near-fatal incident while camping with friends in Kiowa, Colorado, in December.
He had gone on a week-long outdoor trip with his pals when he burnt his thumb while cooking pasta. “I grabbed a skillet wrong and my thumb touched the hot part,” Armstrong recalled. “I could feel it burning as I moved it to the table, but I didn’t want to drop it. I didn’t think much of it as I have gotten burns, scrapes, and cuts from living in the outdoors my whole life.”
After finishing cooking, he cleaned and bandaged the wound. However, a couple of days later, Armstrong noticed that one of his legs was swelling. At first, he dismissed it, thinking the pain wasn’t significant and that he might have hurt his ankle somehow. But by December 7, he felt it was time to head home.
“I decided to head home, and my buddy suggested we go to the hospital,” said Armstrong. “At that point, my toenails started turning purple, and the swelling had increased.”
Confused by the swelling in his legs, Armstrong went to AdventHealth Parker hospital. “By now, the burn on my thumb had become pretty ugly; it had turned black and looked like it was eating away at my thumb,” he said.
While discussing his symptoms with doctors, Armstrong suddenly felt his eyes rolling back and started talking nonsense. It was then that doctors discovered strep A bacteria had entered his thumb burn, quickly developing into sepsis, a life-threatening condition if not treated properly.
Armstrong was transferred to AdventHealth Porter, where better facilities were available, and placed into an induced coma for six days. His family was told to prepare for the worst, but miraculously, Armstrong woke up on December 13.
“Everyone was very happy to see me,” he said. “The doctors told them that I might not make it, and there was a lot of concern that I would never wake up. My family was extremely happy, I could hear them cheering, and then the nurses came in and started cleaning me up.”
However, the joy quickly turned to sadness when Armstrong discovered that his feet were both completely black. Doctors informed him they would need to amputate his legs, as the sepsis had eaten away at his feet and was spreading to his legs, making them unsalvageable.
On December 23, Armstrong underwent a three-hour surgery to amputate both legs and spent a month recovering in the hospital.
Recalling the moment he woke up after the surgery, he said, “Initially when I woke up, I thought my legs were still there, and then I came to realize they weren’t. I felt down my leg and realized that my legs weren’t there. I asked the nurse, and she confirmed that I had my legs amputated.”
“She told me that my family was waiting for me and kept reminding me of them, which anchored me,” he added.
With that motivation, Armstrong left the hospital on January 14 and attended the Sky Ridge Sports Medicine and Rehabilitation clinic in Colorado for another 16 days. Now reliant on a wheelchair for the rest of his life, he is determined to become proficient in triceps and shoulder exercises that will aid his mobility, describing them as his ‘lifeline.’
“It was a hunting trip with friends that turned into a bit of a nightmare,” Armstrong said. “Sadly, dinner was enough for the burn to get strep A.”