Nine-year-old Adyan Alam was on his way home with his family when their routine stop at a service station turned into a nightmare. Moments after ordering food, Adyan collapsed and was unresponsive.
His father, MD Ashraful Alam, 38, told Newsweek: “Everything happened so fast, and we still don’t quite understand how.”
Just days earlier, Adyan had been hiking in Wales, in the U.K. showing no signs of illness. But, on the final day of the trip, fatigue and shortness of breath set in. What his family didn’t know was that Adyan’s body was already in the grip of sepsis—a fast-moving, life-threatening condition the CDC warns can unleash a chain reaction throughout the body.
On December 8, Adyan was discharged from the hospital, and his dad is keen to raise awareness of the serious condition that he had never heard of.
On July 7, Alam recalls ordering his son a burger and the next minute seeing him on the ground. The family rang emergency services who said his heart had stopped and were about to bring him back to life by performing CPR.
Then, at a nearby hospital that was still two hours away from the family’s home in London, Adyan went into another cardiac arrest. His dad recalled: “His organs weren’t functioning—they were shutting down.”
Adyan was in a coma for eight days hooked up to multiple machines including dialysis while being pumped with antibiotics.
“My wife Maisha Jabin, 30, and I had never heard of sepsis before—we were in total shock and worried sick,” said Alam, adding: “We feared he wasn’t going to make it.”
While in a coma, Adyan’s lower legs started to turn black. The Sepsis Alliance says that blood normally flows smoothly through vessels carrying oxygen and nutrients to tissues and removing waste. Clots form only when needed, but in sepsis, the clotting system goes into overdrive, blocking blood flow to extremities.
Without adequate circulation, tissue dies and can turn gangrenous, sometimes requiring surgical removal or even amputation if the damage is extensive.
“We were told he is going to need an amputation because of the lack of blood flow, but they couldn’t do it straight away because he was in a critical condition,” Alam said.
Adyan spent 10 weeks in the intensive care unit (ICU) with his parents by his side, leaving their other 2-year-old son with family members in London.
“Living in ICU was hard; every minute, his vitals were changing like his oxygen and blood pressure dropping. We were in total shock for a while,” Alam said. “We cried relentlessly. We were hoping for the best and just wanted to be at home with both of our sons.”
In September, the football-loving boy had his left leg amputated from the knee down and part of the muscles from his right leg.
Now, he is wheelchair-bound while he waits for a prosthetic leg.
“Our whole life has changed,” said Alam. “Adyan is upset because he used to play football and cycle daily. Now he can’t as his body had to sacrifice his leg due to sepsis.
“He is accepting what happened and coping but it is a big adjustment.
“The journey ahead is tough—our life isn’t the same,” the father said.
The family is now searching for a new place to live as their flat isn’t accessible.
“Nothing can prepare you for any of this,” Alam said. “Everything happened so suddenly, and we are searching for answers—it is hard to recover from all of this.
“But the main thing is we are lucky to have him in our life.”
