Tag Archives: Blood Clots

{Collateral Damage} Merck Settles for $100million in NuvaRing Injury Case

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NuvaringLast night when I got home from work I pulled a large white envelope out of my mailbox. I didn’t give it much thought, I let the muppet like dog out to pee, and when we came in I tossed the envelope on the table. I went about my routine, bracelet in the clam shell, sweats replaced my dress pants, and I fed the dog. Mundane I know, yet as I kneelt down to grab the muppet’s bowel the large envelope caught my eye.

It’s a logo that I’ve seen dozens of times, normally it rested on smaller envelopes, never a large one. I quickly dumped food in the muppet’s bowel and grabbed the envelope. I ripped it open and read “After more than five years of hard-fought and difficult litigation, Merck/Organon USA Inc. has agreed to a Settlement Program to resolve the NuvaRing claims. I read that sentence a dozen times, it didn’t sink in, so I took to Google. The NY Times, The Huffington Post, and so many other media outlets validated what my letter said. I needed validation even thou the settlement was laid out in black and white before me, I needed someone else to tell me that I wasn’t dreaming.

To be honest I never thought I would see this day. I never thought Merck would ever come to the table. Yet they have, Merck, maker of the NuvaRing, says it will pay out $100 million to settle thousands of liability lawsuits from women who say they were harmed by using the product. The settlement was offered to about 3,800 women who have filed lawsuits in federal and state courts. In a statement Friday, the company said: “We stand behind the research that supported the approval of NuvaRing, and our continued work to monitor the safety of the medicine.” The above statement falls on deaf ears, I am 1 out of 3,800 I will go to my grave claiming that the NuvaRing turned my world upside down and injured me. I know in my heart that the NuvaRing is bad news bears, however in the eyes of Merck I am just a casualty, I am the collateral damage they planned for, and I will be nothing more to them.

Tears are still falling even as I write this. Sure I am angry just like everyone else, however I know it makes no sense to beat a dead horse. We wore the white hat, we fought the good fight, yet in the end it wasn’t enough. $100 million seems like pennies compared to the amount Merck’s pockets hold. However this is the only offer and if 95% of women do not opt in, we risk losing it all. I never went into this to become rich, I wanted to stand up for myself and to prevent other women from enduring my fate.

I never had a number in mind, because Merck can never give me back what I want. No one has the power to turn back time and undo the wrongs. Then again on the same coin, I wouldn’t trade what happened to me. The NuvaRing was my sling shot, in a moment of sheer disaster my passion was born. I could have been just another cup of ashes in an urn, instead of an urn I got to see my 27th themed Halloween birthday cake. Almost dying 5 days before your birthday changes your perspective.

Merck brought the NuvaRing into my life, I chose to use it, but I did not chose to have it almost kill me. In all honesty I had no idea that the NuvaRing could cause thrombotic events. Hell I didn’t even know what a pulmonary embolism was until the exact moment I was diagnosed. In that moment my life was changed forever, I lost my sense of youth and was thrown in to survival mode. It looked bleak, my clot sat in a shitty spot and my lungs were dying, yet I pulled through. Because that is what I do. I operate best in a crisis, mainly because I just keep on keeping on and throw caution to the wind.

My lung has healed, my heart is strong, yet I am empty inside. Empty because of complications due to my pulmonary embolism I can never have children. To be honest I went on the NuvaRing in an attempt to regulate my cycle in hopes to get my hormones in order so that I could become pregnant. A lot of my friends went on it, they got babies and I got a blood clot. I got the shitty hand while they were dealt the motherhood card. I can never be on hormonal contraceptives or under go fertility treatments because I now have an increased risk of blood clots. If by the grace of God I were somehow able to conceive I would need to be put on blood thinners as soon as possible. This in its self is a risky decision, because I run the chance of giving birth to a child who is anticoagulant dependent. Like I said the risks are far to great and at the end of the day I must play the cards I have.

I want more than anything to have a child of my own. Merck will never be able to restore my ability to have children, they will never be able to make me whole. My heart aches when I hold a new born, I feel that tug, yet I know it was never meant to be. The NuvaRing crushed my dreams, I will never know what its like to carry a child and I will never get to hold a baby of my own. This, this is something Merck cannot put a price tag on. They just chalk it up to collateral damage and promise to monitor the product.

In there eyes I am nothing more than collateral damage, my quality of life means nothing to them, my struggles are mine and mine alone. The only thing they care about are the profits that the NuvaRing rakes in, so what if it damages a woman and crushes her dreams of motherhood. For every victim there is another woman to take her place in the pharmacy line.

If you would like to read more about the NuvaRing Settlement Please visit the following:

Birth Control And Blood Clots: Women Still Weighing The Risks http://n.pr/1dvY3OZ

Federal judge in St. Louis endorses $100 million settlement offer for NuvaRing cases : Business http://bit.ly/1h71yk2

Merck To Pay $100 Million In NuvaRing Settlement http://huff.to/1g2BAxr

Merck to pay $100 million in NuvaRing contraceptive settlement http://reut.rs/1jkdWAn

{Hearts on 22} Why I Go RED

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Left: 2009 / Right 2013 Looking back and celebrating 4 years of Survival

Left: 2009 / Right 2013 Looking back and celebrating 4 years of Survival

On October 14, 2009 I had my annual check up and birth control renewal appointment. My Doctor asked me if I had any concerns. I said yes. “Yes I do, I have this incredible pain in my leg and it won’t go away. My leg is deep red in spots and I am having head aches.” The doctor said and I quote “oh you just need to exercise and drink more water. You will be fine.”

October 22, 2009, 7:00am I was driving through rush hour traffic when my chest started hurting. At first it was just annoying and I thought “oh I will just take some Tylenol when I get to work. It’s nothing.” The pain kept on getting worse and worse, my heart started racing, at this point I could barely breath. Again I though “I will make it to work, take Tylenol and I will be fine.” I kept on driving. My situation wasn’t improving, my arms were starting to feel numb, I was becoming light headed. I thought to my self “should I call my mom. No, don’t do that she will panic. Should I pull over and dial 911? No, don’t do that you don’t want to be stuck on the side of the road. Oh look Lexington parkway. Take the exit.”

I did take that exit and somehow by the grace of God I drove myself to the hospital in Woodbury. The last thing I remember is seeing the security guard hold out his arm and I collapsed. I woke up to a nurse telling me “I can either cut your clothes off or you can help me take them off.” The staff had all ready hooked me up to monitors and an EKG machine.

The doctor came in and said “well we know you are not having a heart attack but something is wrong. I think you might have an infection in your lung. Well take an X-ray and get you some meds and you will be out of here in no time.” Ok I said. Then he stopped turned around and said “are you on birth control.” Yes I said. He ordered more tests.

My heart had been in sinus tachycardia for over an hour, my oxygen level was below 40 and I was fading fast. The D-dime test came back positive and a CT scan was done. A blood clot the size of a 10 cent gum ball was blocking the main valve to my heart and my body was being starved of oxygen. Within minutes of this discovery, I had a stroke.

The ER staff was kicked into high gear and the life saving efforts began. Clot busters were injected, they gave me the highest possible dose of Heprin, and my life was saved.

But what gets me is this “this all could have been prevented if my OBGYN had truly listened to me, she could have ordered the d-dime test and the clot would have been found and it would never have traveled to my lungs.” I almost died 5 days before my 27th birthday. I got the best gift in 2009 and that was my life.

So please listen to your heart and mostly your gut. If something doesn’t feel right keep on pushing until you find the one doctor who will listen to you. Don’t end up like me, I learned the hard way. Now I never take a doctors word at face value and I ask questions.

One moment changed everything, I was robbed of my youth and now I am going RED because no woman deserves to fight alone.

{Hearts on 22} Love With All of Your Heart

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Sophia and featherChristmas is when I miss Charlie the most. Mostly because he got cheated. Cheated out of meeting Sophia. He was anticipating her arrival and received status updates on the progress of her birth. A trial kept him in New York and he couldn’t wait to hang up his traveling suit and snuggle his niece in his arms. Charlie never got to see her smile, hear her laughter or feel her tiny hand in his. Sophia never got to meet the man who dreamed of taking her to Paris and who would have spoiled her beyond her wildest imagination. Charlie died loving the tiny girl he never got to meet.

As I sit back and reflect I can’t help but to think about all of the people who have never laid eyes on their niece or nephew. Sure deadly drunk driving accidents stick in our minds. After all one drunk driver took Charlie an 4 other people out on a wintry Valentine’s Day. That was one moment in time, yet in that moment hundreds of women lost their lives to heart disease and stroke. Hundreds more died that day from a Pulmonary Embolisms or other hormonal contraceptive related side effect. Those lives never make the news, they just fade quietly into the timelines of history.

If it were not for my care team I would have joined the fading time line. I would have been another casualty not a news worthy story. There isn’t a day that goes by where I do not thank God for keeping me on this earth. For answering my silent prayer and giving me the strength to fight. For giving me the strength to stand up and shout my story from the roof tops. With each word spoken I began to heal my broken heart, I penned my name on a legal services agreement and became a plaintiff in the Multidistrict Litigation against Merck. I put myself out there in hopes that I could save one woman from enduring my hell. I love with all of my heart and in a sheer moment of utter disaster my passion was born.

My purpose is clear “educate those around me about the dangers of hormonal contraceptives, blood clots, stroke and pulmonary embolism warning signs.” I will not rest until the Nuva Ring is pulled from he market and until doctors properly inform their patients of the risk associated with the use of hormonal contraceptives. Charlie was the one who pushed me to share my story with the world. He took up my mission and would stand in the wings watching me with tears in his eyes as I brought tears to the audience. I am alive today because I listed to my heart.

When Charlie died my heart was broken and it healed each time I held our niece in my arms. Each time I heard her laughter, held her tiny hand in mine, and listen to her whisper Auntie” for the first time. To think the Nuva Ring almost robbed me of those moments. My birth control almost cheated me out of being an aunt. The Nuva Ring almost claimed my life and it changed me in more ways than I could ever explain. However it will never ever stop me from loving Sophia with all of my surviving heart. Sophia will grow up with the notion that she is one lucky little girl. Because she could be holding a picture of the woman she calls Auntie. Instead she gets to hold her aunties hand and play. She is lucky because God allowed her Aunt to be the 1 out of 5 who got to walk away from a massive pulmonary embolism on October 22, 2009.

As I watch Sophia unwrap her gifts I will be thinking about all of my sisters who lost the battle. About all of those who would gladly take my seat at the table and those who are fighting with all of their hearts. Families will gather and thousands of children will hear stories about the women they never got to meet. Heart disease, strokes, and pulmonary embolisms are taking to many aunties out of the equation. To many children are walking in memory of the woman they never got to call “Auntie” and never got to love with all of their hearts.

{Hearts on 22} Celebrating My 4th Borrowed Year

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{Photo by Stephanie Ryan Photography}

{Photo by Stephanie Ryan Photography}


There are moments were I feel like the little girl from Schindler’s list. You know the little girl in the one scene of the movie where everything is in black and white except for her red coat. Over the past four years I have heard more stories of pulmonary embolism loss than survival. I realize that only 1 out of 5 patients will survive a pulmonary embolism, yet it still moves me. Long ago I stopped asking God why he spared me and called another home in my place. At some point you stop wondering and start living. Living my life is the only way I know how to honor the four people who died so I could be the one who walked away. I vowed to make every year, month, week, day, hour, minute, and second of my life count, as I know I am living on borrowed time.

I have crisscrossed this country, speaking in church basements, town halls, elementary school classrooms, and college campuses educating women on the side effects of birth control. Educating women on heart health, blood clots, and mostly empowering them to be their own health care advocate. They listen wide-eyed as I tell my tale and go over the symptoms/warning signs. Only to find tears in their eyes as they realize that I almost died five days before my 27th birthday.

That out of anything I say is what sticks with people, the fact that I almost died five days before my 27th birthday. I can still see my Mam’s face as she walked into my room, her fear was so thick you could have cut it with a knife, her eyes filled with tears as she whispered “It should be my laying in that bed, you are to damn young for this.” She took my hand, rubbed my head, and promised me that we were going to beat this. She allowed me to cry for one minute and then I had to put my big girl pants on and fight. I had IVs coming from all directions, wires and leads tapped to every limb, in that moment my future looked bleak, yet I knew that this would pass, and that I would bounce back.

I’ve wasted enough precious time thinking about what I can’t have or do. Its taken a while but I have come t terms with the notion that I will never carry a child of my own, that I will not run a marathon, or climb a mountain. Instead I now focus on what I can do, I can adopt a child, walk a 5K really fast with my sister, and I will settle for the top of a hill any day. Most of all I can use my story to help educate my girlfriends and strangers about the deadly side effects of birth control. I can share my story with my Legislators, Congressmen, and Representatives, to strengthen the fact that we need more research on Heart Disease and Stroke in women.

My pulmonary embolism was the ER staffs main concern and my slight stroke was just a bonus. They both wreaked havoc on my body, yet I am still standing. When I look in the mirror I no longer see flaws, instead I see a body that’s been through hell and back. I see a body that survived a pulmonary embolism with infarction and a stroke, I have no doubt that it will carry me through a lot more. I have come to terms with the fact that I will never have my pre-PE/Stroke body back. I am just happy to be standing.

I am haunted by a comment my Mama made, she said “if my daughter didn’t get to the hospital when she did, I would have been picking out her urn instead of her 27th Halloween themed birthday cake.” That comment humbles me and reminds me how close I cam to death that day. My heart goes out to the families who have had to bury a loved one who died unexpectedly from a pulmonary embolism. That’s the thing, they are silent, and one never knows that they have a blood clot in their lungs until its to late. Most don’t even know why their child suddenly dropped dead, that is until the autopsy results confirm that they died of a blood clot in their lungs. I think about the women who never got to hold their niece, about the fathers who never got to walk their daughters down the isle, and about the women who were called home all to soon.

I live each day of my life for all of the women who died and for all of my survivor sisters still fighting the good fight. I will stand with my survivor sisters as we continue our wrongful injury/product liability suit against the makers of the Nuva Ring. One day justice will prevail, the souls of the lost will rest, and the broken will heal.

THANK YOU: A day doesn’t go by where I do not think about my care team at Woodwinds Health campus. Because of the ER staffs quick thinking and action I am alive today. I am alive because the doctor stopped what he was doing to ask me “by chance do you use birth control?” Extra test were ordered, a CT scan was given, and with in 30 minutes the clot was found. It was found because of that one little question and I am forever in debt to him. My stroke was stopped in its tracks because of the thrombolytics I received and for that I am forever grateful. I wouldn’t be alive today if it were not for the Doctors and nurses of Woodwinds, for they put this broken girl back together again and sent her back out into the world.

Because No Woman Deserves to Fight ALONE!

To Learn more about Pulmonary embolism and blood clots please visit the following:
Resources from the Mayo Clinic:
http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/pulmonary-embolism/DS00429
http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/blood-clots/MY00109
http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/deep-vein-thrombosis/DS01005
The National Blood Clot Alliance – Stop The Clot: http://www.stoptheclot.org/

To Learn more about Stroke and Heart Disease please visit the following:
Resources from the Mayo Clinic: http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/stroke/DS00150
The American Heart Association: http://www.heart.org/HEARTORG/
The American Stroke Association: http://www.strokeassociation.org/STROKEORG/
Power To End Stroke: http://powertoendstroke.org/
Go Red for Women: https://www.goredforwomen.org/
Please Join me in making a difference by joining “You’re The Cure”: http://yourethecure.org/aha/advocacy/default.aspx