New mom gets heart transplant to save her life
(CNN) -- Sunday is Mother's Day and one Wisconsin woman is grateful to be alive for it. She has an infant daughter -- and a new heart -- after hers went into failure during pregnancy.
"They told me I was in heart failure and I just didn't believe it. I just could not comprehend what that meant," Susan Siegenthaler recalled. "I didn't know if heart failure meant I was dying or, I couldn't even wrap my head around it."
At seven-and-a-half months pregnant, Siegenthaler was experiencing symptoms she thought were what came with being pregnant.
But her gut told her differently.
An otherwise healthy 38-year-old with no family history of heart disease, Siegenthaler was in heart failure and was put on heart medication that wouldn't harm her unborn baby, Stevie.
A c-section was then scheduled for December 26 but she naturally went into labor the night before, KMTV reported.
"Before we had her, it was really scary. I didn't know if she was going to make it through the labor and it was scarier than wondering if I was going to make it through the labor," Siegenthalers said.
Born premature, Stevie was otherwise healthy, but the next task for doctors at University of Wisconsin Health was to not only keep Stevie healthy in the NICU, but to save Siegenthaler's life by continuing with medication for her heart, which was pumping at a five to 10% fraction rate.
"Every time they mentioned worst-case scenario, it ended up happening, and eventually they put me on the transplant list," Siegenthaler said.
She waited 11 days for a new heart, which health professionals at UW Health said heart failure and pregnancy is rare.
"Certainly, heart failure that progresses to the point of needing a heart transplant in the immediate post-partum period is an exquisitely rare thing," said Dr. Michael Beninati, a maternal-fetal medicine and critical care doctor at UW Health.
But defying the odds, Siegenthaler was given a second chance at life thanks to a stranger.
"As happy as we are, somebody had to lose a loved one. That thought crosses my mind a lot," Siegenthaler said. "Especially on Mother's Day because you know it's very possible we wouldn't have had a Mother's Day without them."
Now, they are able to spend this first Mother's Day as a happy and healthy family of three.