Pregnant with COVID, she survived a nightmare – Orange County Register

Amy Yamaguchi met her daughter when she was just 5 months old.

That’s because at the time of the cesarean section, Yamaguchi was in a coma and contracted COVID-19.

And that’s only part of the story.

The Seal Beach resident will soon become the first COVID-19 patient at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles to receive a double lung transplant. She was also one of the hospital’s first COVID patients to be placed on a life-support machine often described by experts as “Hail”.

Yamaguchi suffered a series of minor strokes. And she had to relearn how to walk. At one point, her feet were in a cast so she could push straight into the ground again.

In August, after about eight months in the hospital and rehab center, Yamaguchi went home.

Since then, each week has brought a new milestone. And as she settled in with her husband Danny Levin and their daughter, Maren Marie, Yamaguchi developed an appreciation for things that are easily taken for granted.

“Just being home is a joy. Just sitting at the table with the family,” she said. “Now, we have one more member. It’s great to be a mother.”

“We’re settling back into what life should be like.”

When COVID-19 hits

On December 1, 2020, the day she tested positive for COVID-19, Yamaguchi was nearly 36 weeks pregnant. She and her husband carefully put on masks and followed safety measures, but at the time there was no vaccine and the pandemic was turning into a deadly winter outbreak.

For several days, Levin watched Yamaguchi, watching for her increasingly severe symptoms. When her oxygen levels fell dangerously low, he took her to Orange Coast Medical Center in Fountain Valley.

Due to the health regulations in effect at the time, Levin and Yamaguchi were unable to meet face-to-face. Two days after her admission, before her emergency delivery, they texted and chatted in their cell.

“We told each other we loved each other and said we would see each other again soon, with the whole family,” Levin said.

Then… silence.

“That was the last time I spoke to Amy until February.”

The cesarean section delivered a healthy baby – and marked the beginning of Yamaguchi’s coma.

Doctors thought the surgery would help Yamaguchi heal faster by freeing up space for her lungs. It didn’t. Soon after, Maren was sent home to her father and Yamaguchi was transferred to Cedars-Sinai.

The future looks dark.

“Who is this guy?”

Around mid-January, while on life support at Cedars-Sinai, Yamaguchi began to emerge from his coma.

She was tied to an upright hospital bed as a way to help her regain her strength. Even though she’s still on a ventilator, she can still talk around it. Food is delivered through a tube, first through the nose and then through the stomach.

In March, with the help of a favorite nurse, Yamaguchi arranged to get her husband a commemorative gift from the hospital gift shop. It was a T-shirt, printed with the hospital’s name, made of cotton, the traditional material for the third anniversary.

Levin said: “She is fighting for her life, on life support, and she still gets my anniversary present.

While Yamaguchi’s “sobs” has returned, physical problems remain. A blood clot formed on her arm. And her lungs are still not working.

Doctors placed her in a machine called ECMO, which oxygenated the extracorporeal membrane, pumping the patient’s blood out of their body, through the artificial lung, and back.

At the time, her duration of treatment was rare for the hospital’s COVID patients. Patients placed on ECMO are usually treated, for a maximum of several weeks; Yamaguchi joined ECMO for 119 days.

However, her lungs are still not improving.

Dominic Emerson, her primary physician at Cedars-Sinai, describes her lungs as fibrotic, which means they can’t expand like normal lungs.

“A normal lung will feel like a marshmallow. Emerson, associate surgical director of Cardiac Implants and Mechanical Circulatory Support at the Smidt Heart Institute.

In April, Yamaguchi became the hospital’s first COVID patient to receive a lung transplant. Nationally, more than 200 COVID patients have received lung transplants, Emerson said.

Why COVID hit Yamaguchi so much remains unknown.

“She is a perfectly healthy, normal, active 35-year-old woman,” said Emerson. “That’s why it’s important for everyone to get vaccinated. You may think that because you are young you will be safe. But, unfortunately, I have seen a lot of people who are young but actually get sick and die of Covid. ”

Yamaguchi’s pregnancy could be a factor, “but we don’t know,” Emerson said. According to the Centers for Disease Control, pregnant women “More likely to become seriously ill from COVID-19 than people who are not pregnant.”

Doctors call her recovery remarkable, a testament to the power of technology and the evolving ways medical technology is being used to save lives during the pandemic.

During the transplant surgery, Yamaguchi suffered a small stroke. It was these things that affected her memory.

As she came out of the surgery, Yamaguchi said she asked her mother a question:

“Who is this guy hanging out with the nurses?” She said, “Amy, that’s your husband.”

“I said, ‘I’m married?'”

Her mother then asked her daughter if she knew her age. Yamaguchi, 35 years old at the time, said she was 22 years old.

“I was a bit disappointed.”

Yamaguchi soon learns that she is not only married, but also has a child.

However, while some memories return, others do not.

“I don’t remember being pregnant with Maren,” Yamaguchi said. “Some things are getting better, when I watch videos and pictures, but I don’t remember the stomach.”

Meet her baby

After surgery in April, Yamaguchi left ECMO. But she is still on a ventilator, which is still needed to pump oxygen into her body.

Over the next two months, she gradually improved.

Even the little things turn into small celebrations.

“She raised her hand and scratched her nose, and she did it without thinking,” Levin said. “I remember being very happy about that.”

In May, a few days before Mother’s Day, Yamaguchi saw Maren for the first time.

Yamaguchi is in a wheelchair in the hospital square and still uses an oxygen tank and ventilator.

And she was very worried. She missed the original mother-son relationship. She was worried about how her daughter would react.

“I feel like I’m on a date. Will she like me? ”

“But then I had to meet her and everything was fine,” Yamaguchi said. “It sounds cliché, but it’s like lightning love.”

After that, Sunday became a child’s day for Yamaguchi. The rest of the week is filled with therapies – physical therapy, occupational therapy, speech therapy. But Sunday is devoted to “Maren therapy.”

“It’s the best therapy,” says Yamaguchi.

On June 1, doctors removed a tube in her trachea to help her breathe. Later that month, she was transferred to a rehabilitation center, where she walked for the first time since the coma: eight steps on the first day.

On August 3, Yamaguchi went home.

Since then, she has continued her therapy and continues to make strides. She has transitioned from using a walker and cane wheelchair to walking on her own. Picking up Maren, alone, was a big deal.

Wednesday, January 5th, marks another important milestone: “Today is the first day I’ve taken her out of the crib and changed her.”

“I am doing well,” she added. “Major improvements are being made.”

The couple went back and forth between their home in Seal Beach and her parents’ home in Garden Grove. Levin, 35, works online as a teacher for a charter school. And Yamaguchi, a former customer service representative of hemophilia treatment centers, is focusing all his energy on her health and motherhood.

Aware of the quick and easy spread of the Omicron variant, the pair rarely take risks. And when they do they wear masks. Both are vaccinated.

“We haven’t really gone anywhere yet,” Yamaguchi said. Instead, she is enjoying time with her daughter and family.

“I had to give myself the grace and forgiveness that life didn’t go as we planned. Now, I have a lot of time with her.”

Last month, the couple celebrated Maren’s first birthday. The party was very small. The theme is Alice in Wonderland.