Thirty years ago on Wednesday, February 14, 1996, I awoke in the wee hours of the morning with shooting pains throughout my body. My husband rushed me to Vassar Brothers Hospital in Poughkeepsie, NY where our physician informed him that I met all the criteria for a condition known as septic shock which had resulted in multiple organ system failure. Septic shock is a life-threatening medical emergency. If undetected or left untreated, it can result in lifelong organ dysfunction, limb amputations, and often death. It occurs when antibodies released into the bloodstream to fight an infection of any kind, from a simple cut to a more dramatic one, trigger inflammatory responses throughout the body, causing multiple organ systems to fail and leaving limbs in danger of succumbing to gangrene. Insufficient oxygenated blood and nutrients reach organs and limbs for survival. Septic shock causes blood pressure to drop dramatically, often leading to death within hours.



Whatever precipitated my antibodies to go into overdrive was, and will forever remain, an unsolvable mystery. Doctors found no evidence of any infection of any kind, not bacterial, not viral, not fungal, and not parasitic. The best “guess” of the infectious disease expert and critical care team was a coughing or sneezing student I taught in one of my classes could have been a carrier of something idiopathic (unknown). They also determined I had a very healthy immune system, yet during the course of less than one day I went from being a healthy and fit thirty-four-year-old wife and mother to a woman trapped in the body of an elderly, dying patient. My husband was told I had a ten percent chance of survival and likely 24 to 36 hours left. I was told not to worry. It was just a "bad bug.”



As required by New York State law at the time, the hospital notified the Dutchess County Board of Health, who in turn notified the New York State Department of Health shortly after I arrived in the Emergency Department. They were summoned to investigate a possible epidemic. The officials conducted a thorough investigation of every classroom and building I had entered and determined there was no epidemic. Officials gave my husband their card and wanted to be kept apprised of my condition.



I was then transferred to the Intensive Care Unit. I had difficulty keeping my eyes open so I closed them. I heard a faint conversation between my husband and the head nurse. Although I tried to open my eyes to see my husband, I could not. My lids felt heavy. I heard my husband ask her if I would be comfortable. She replied, “Very comfortable.” Although I could hear them perfectly, I misunderstood what they were talking about. The nurse did keep her promise to my husband. I was very comfortable, and I felt no pain.



By nightfall, I could no longer breathe on my own. I was given more morphine to facilitate the insertion of the breathing tube. Most of my organs were now failing. My legs were covered in what is known as petechiae - bleeding through the skin, and my arms were bright purple. I was hooked up to multiple intravenous lines, and my ankles and feet had swelled to three times their normal size. Even if I somehow survived, my ankles and feet would probably not make it. The doctors told my husband there was, however, one positive sign. My brain was functioning normally. Incredibly, I was not in a coma. I was just sleeping.



Although I suffered systemic inflammatory response syndrome, acute respiratory distress syndrome, on a respirator, acute renal failure, acute liver failure, complete gastrointestinal failure, and required multiple blood transfusions, I was awake, alert, and oriented the entire time and communicated by pointing to an alphabet board. My heart was now working overtime to keep me alive.



The next day, cards, balloons, and stuffed animals adorned my glass-enclosed room from friends, neighbors, students, and their parents. Three of my ob-gyn group of five physicians came to see me, including the female physician, Dr. Saychek who had delivered my son 8 years earlier. My room in the Intensive Care Unit seemed more like a doctor’s lounge. More chairs had to be brought in. Everyone was smiling, and Dr. Saychek held my hand as she spoke to me. She even joked about how “Dr. Lederman” was not quick enough to keep up with how quickly I was pointing to the “letters.” I thought to myself that it must have been a slow day in Labor and Delivery.



Two days later, although still critical, I was taken off the respirator. I interpreted this as a sign that I was improving, but that was not at all accurate. Although my breathing had improved slightly, multiple organs were still failing as I remained critical. I was still being told “not to worry” as they prepared my father for what was likely his final visit with his daughter.



Later, my father appeared in the doorway. He seemed to be moving in slow motion as he approached an armchair in the corner of my room. I opened my eyes as wide as I could and in a raspy, post-intubation voice, I said, “Hi Papi.” I could see he was trying hard to smile. He slowly sat down and said “Bonjour Audrina.” I tried to tell him I was okay but his face looked so broken. I pictured the trail of coins he used to leave on his way back from the men’s room at Jones Beach on Long Island, New York so I could discover the treasure when he took me for walks immediately afterwards. I pictured the vendors selling Italian ices. I wished my father and I were there so he could buy me one.


​
That evening, a physician I had not seen before, entered my room. He asked me my name. How silly, I thought. He was holding a clipboard. Wasn’t my name on it? I replied, “Audrey Lasky.” He then asked me who the president of the United States was. I hesitated as I thought, “How long have I been sleeping?” It was 1996, an election year. Incumbent Bill Clinton and Bob Dole were running. Did nine months go by? Had Bill Clinton been re-elected or did we have a new president? Hoping it was still February and still 1996, I replied, “Bill Clinton?” The doctor then asked me to recite the months of the year backwards. At that moment, I realized this physician was summoned to see if I had my wits about me. I replied by asking him in which language he wanted that, French, Italian or Spanish. He smiled and identified himself as a neurologist. He went on to tell me how incredible it was that my entire body had shut down, yet my brain was left completely unaffected. Apparently this physician had not received the memo that I had not been told. Although it was difficult, I kept my cool. I wanted to hear what he had to say. He told me I was very fortunate that my physician Dr. Gerber had been on call February 14th since he was one of very few physicians who had actually treated a patient with septic shock and multiple organ system failure rather than one who had simply read about it in medical school books.

​

TO BE CONTINUED in person during live book talks where I recount how I almost died from a non-preventable, sudden-onset event. My healthy lifestyle of climbing on my own two feet, lifting weights progressively, and eating well via healthy whole food for the previous six years (1990-1996) were the very reasons I survived and continued to live well at age 64. I recount what happened on Valentine's Day here. I recount what transpired for the next 29 days in ICU and how it will help you and your loved ones during live book talks. 

​Although the winter of 1996 was brutal, the Northeast suffered one of the most treacherous blizzards 27 years earlier. Although I was only seven years old, I remember the infamous Blizzard of February 10, 1969 very well. I was traveling with my mother aboard a flight from Austin, Texas back home to Northern New Jersey after a two-week visit with relatives. The storm would later be nicknamed “The Lindsay Storm” after former New York City mayor John Lindsay was ultimately held responsible for the lack of timely and appropriate snow-removal efforts following a completely inaccurate weather forecast. The storm paralyzed the entire New York/New Jersey Metropolitan Area, leaving 42 people dead and 288 injured. Although Newark International Airport managed to shut down in time, six thousand passengers and airport employees were trapped at John F. Kennedy International Airport. Emergency conditions resulted in the urgent need for food and water to be air-dropped as stranded passengers begged airport vendors and one another for cigarettes and gum. The front pages of all the New York Metro newspapers graphically reported the events as they unfolded, including the story of three people who had frozen to death in their car. My mother and I were now caught in the middle of one of the deadliest storms of the twentieth century.


Although our Braniff Airlines flight was scheduled to land in Newark, that was not to be. Mother Nature had other plans. The entire northeast corridor had all but completely shut down forcing our flight to be diverted to Washington DC’s Dulles Airport. Our only option was to seek available ground transportation. The weather conditions made it quite the journey via Amtrak train from Washington DC to New York City’s Penn Station. Upon arrival, we had to endure the seemingly impossible and bitterly cold nine city block walk to Manhattan’s Port Authority Bus Terminal in two feet of snow.


When we arrived at the 42nd Street bus station, my mother locked our luggage in a storage locker available for rent in those days. With little cash left, she quickly bought something for her little daughter to eat. It was early 1969, several months before my mother was to join the workforce outside the home. She had no credit card. My mother knew she had to keep every penny she could since we were not yet in the comfort and safety of my father’s presence. As we walked upstairs to the bus lines, I started to feel good about getting on a warm bus home. My mother’s face, however, suddenly looked even paler than it already had been when the ticket agent informed her that the 167 bus had already stopped running for the night. We had no choice but to board an alternate bus which could only drop us off one town away from where we actually lived. It is curious, though, what a seven-year-old remembers. I was in first grade at the time and could easily read numbers and basic sight words. I also knew that Dumont was not Teaneck nor was it Queen Anne Road. Both of those routes would have taken us almost to our door. The bus driver did tell my mother, however, that he would try to go out of his way as much as he legally could since he knew we needed route 167, not 166.


After a very slow journey out of Manhattan, the bus driver stopped the bus and opened the door. He hesitated as he turned to my mother to tell her this was the closest he could get to Teaneck. He had no choice but to drop us off. As we exited the bus he told my mother to be careful. She thanked him as we got off. We were now four miles from home.
After walking quite a bit, a male driver stopped to ask if he could drive us to wherever we were headed. My mother, however, was very cautious about getting into a car with a man she did not know. She had been educated in a private parochial girls’ school. Nuns taught that accepting such an offer would not be proper or safe. My mother politely declined and told him we were almost home. That statement was not at all accurate.


Later, a car with both a male driver and a female passenger stopped to ask if we needed a ride. This time my mother accepted. Although in 1969 many Caucasians would have declined such an offer from an African-American couple, my mother did not. She had been raised differently. My mother knew instinctively this couple was trying to help a woman with a little girl walking alone on a bitterly cold night.


We were now safe and warm inside the car of the good Samaritans. As the car approached the immediate vicinity of our apartment, I became excited as I could now recognize Teaneck. We passed our dentist’s office as the car made the two turns necessary to reach our one-way street, Walraven Drive. We were now minutes from the end of what turned out to be the most unanticipated and arduous journey home.


I will never forget the look on my father’s face as my mother and I climbed to the second floor of our garden apartment. He acted as though he believed he would never see us again. There were, of course, no cell phones in those days and all the telephone lines were down. He had no idea what happened to us other than all flights bound for the New York/New Jersey Metropolitan Area as well as New England had been diverted to the Mid-Atlantic region and points south. The memory of February 10, 1969, reappeared on the overnight of March 1, 1996 and again today, February 10, 2026.

​
TO BE CONTINUED in 4 days on the 30th anniversary of my saving my own life on Valentine's Day 1996 (including how and why it matters to you and your loved ones in the 21st century).