A 23-year-old mom thought she just had a rash when she noticed a red mark on her thigh. It turned out to be a near-fatal blood clot.
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Her birth control pill caused a blood clot to develop in her limb. At first, Hanah Thornton thought she had just pulled a muscle in her thigh from going to the gym. However, when it didn't go away, she decided to get it checked out.
"It was about two inches long and it travelled from under my knee all the way up my thigh. On Tuesday I went to work and I couldn't walk on my leg. The redness was going a lot higher up my leg now and the tenderness and the swelling was getting worse," she explained
Initially, the doctor diagnosed her with cellulitis and gave her antibiotics. But the red mark kept growing on her leg. The 23-year-old mom decided to get her leg checked out at a different hospital. An ultrasound confirmed that she had a blood clot.
She said, "I ended up going back to a different hospital later in the day and I was booked in for an ultrasound. In the ultrasound the sonographer immediately told me that I had a blood clot. He told me where it was tracking, which was from the bottom of my knee all the way up to my groin area."
The red mark originated in her groin where a clot had grown. Doctors immediately determined her birth control caused it and gave her blood thinners.
Blood Clot Almost Became Worse
The blood clot was just a centimeter away from a large vein in her leg. It could have ended up moving to her lungs.
"I'd say it was at least 60 centimeters and it was up the whole vein," Thornton explained. "It was one centimeter from being away from a big vein that could have traveled into my lung. It was very close to being life or death."
The 23-year-old says she's lucky to be alive.
"It is a scary thing to go through. Knowing that it was a life or death situation," she said. "If I hadn't treated it in time or stood my ground to say something was wrong, how much longer would this have gone on and how much longer would I have been here for it?"
She also highlighted what she wants others to know. She said, "I would tell other women to educate themselves. As a mum, I understand that someone might go on the pill so they don't have another baby. I will never disagree with being on a pill but I would say really talk to your doctor and understand the risks that could happen as you could be that one person."
