A Michigan mother believes her baby saved her life when she was diagnosed with a rare genetic disease that causes life-threatening blood vessel disorders during pregnancy.
Amanda Banik, 35, said she had a smooth and healthy pregnancy with her first child, a daughter named Baylor, until she was around 35 weeks pregnant when she started experiencing severe chest pain.
Worried she was having a heart attack, Banik asked her husband to take her to the emergency room, where she was observed for several hours before being diagnosed with indigestion and anxiety. He said he was given an explanation and sent home.
A few days later, Banik said he experienced chest pain again, this time radiating to his jaw and was accompanied by blurred vision.
“At that moment, I felt like this was my limit. I thought I was going to die,” Banik told “Good Morning America.” “I didn't know how else to explain it. I'd never felt anything like this before.”
Despite the severe pain, Banik said she told her husband she didn't want to go back to the emergency room because of her previous experience.
“I argued because I thought he was going to send me home with anxiety again,” she recalled. “I was also scared to go to the hospital.”
Bannick said her husband, Derek, persisted and took her to a local hospital.
Banik said when he arrived, doctors told him he needed to be immediately transported to a large hospital in Grand Rapids, Michigan, more than 130 miles from his home in Hartford.
She was diagnosed with aortic dissection. This is a life-threatening condition in which there is a tear in the aorta, the main artery that pumps blood from the heart to the rest of the body. According to the U.S. National Library of Medicine. It affects only 2 in 10,000 people and is most common in men between the ages of 40 and 70.
Ms Banik said the doctors treating her remained calm about the seriousness of her diagnosis to help keep her calm as well.
“I don't think I had any idea what was going on until I got to Grand Rapids and was rolled into an operating room packed with doctors, nurses and technicians,” Banik said. “Then I realized this was a pretty serious situation.”
She continued, “The last thing I remember saying was, 'Please let me see my baby.'”
Dr. Erin Frickea board-certified obstetrician-gynecologist who cared for Banik when he arrived at Corewell Health in Grand Rapids, said there were about 20 medical workers in the room prepared to treat Banik.
“Not many people have this serious condition during pregnancy,” Fricke says. “I remember thinking how scared she must have been. When she came into the operating room on a stretcher, I immediately went to her side and said, 'I'm Fricke. I’m the doctor, I’m going to help you.’ Take care of you and deliver the baby.”
Ms. Banik gave birth to her daughter, Baylor, on May 9, 2023, through an emergency caesarean section led by Dr. Fricke.
Fricke and Banik said that despite Banik's life-threatening condition, Baylor was born healthy and they did not see their daughter until nearly a week later.
Read more: Draft recommendations for blood pressure screening during pregnancy expanded for the first time
Immediately after giving birth, Banik said she underwent an approximately 13-hour aortic dissection repair surgery to repair a tear in her aorta.
The next morning, she said she underwent another open-heart surgery, a triple bypass surgery, to reroute blood around an artery.
“Over the course of 24 hours, I underwent triple bypass surgery, a C-section, and an aortic dissection repair,” Banik said. ”[Doctors] I contacted my family to let them know that I was the sickest person in the hospital and the only thing they could do about me was my age and pre-pregnancy health and the fact that I was young and healthy. ”
While Banik spent the next week on life support, her husband moved between two different rooms in the hospital. Banik's room was the intensive care unit, and Baylor's room was the neonatal intensive care unit, where she was born prematurely.
“He had a pair of tennis shoes that were pretty new, but he literally had holes in the bottom of these tennis shoes because he was walking back and forth and basically running while I was in the hospital. It was empty,” Banik said. “We had been working hard for this baby for several years, but we didn't know if he was going to continue into fatherhood and whether he would have to raise this child on his own. It was really terrible.”
Derek Bannick said while his wife was on life support, doctors told her multiple times that they didn't know if she would survive.
“I feel like I'm a pretty tough guy when it comes to things like that, and that weighed on me,” he said. “Honestly, I can't thank God enough.”
The Bunnixes ensured that while Baylor was unconscious and on life support, nurses held him close to his mother, allowing the new mother to touch her newborn's skin and vice versa. He said it was the same.
“The only time I reacted to life support was when they had skin-to-skin contact. [Baylor]”And apparently when they do that, I cry,” Banik said. “Love is a powerful thing and the bond between a mother and her baby is unreal.”
Banik said she was able to meet Baylor for the first time since she was taken off life support on Mother's Day, May 14, 2023.
Doctors later told her Baylor saved her life, she said.
“Because of the way I dissected it, it was like she was there, essentially holding everything together,” Banik said. “If she hadn't been there and put pressure in all the right places, my result could have been a lot different. So she's kind of a little miracle in a lot of ways. ”
Read more: Mother with rare double uterus says she gave birth to twin girls on two different days
Baylor was also the motivation for Banik to heal and leave the hospital as quickly as the hospital. Doctors told him he would likely need to go to rehabilitation and then be cared for at home, but Banik said he was discharged from the hospital within 20 days and was able to go home.
”[Derek] “He was with me every day, he saw the baby every day, and my recovery wouldn't have been the same without that,” Banik said. It exceeds all their expectations. ”
Banik, who nearly died after giving birth, was able to celebrate the holidays with her husband and daughter and celebrate the new year, when Baylor turned one.
After the aortic dissection, Banik said she underwent further tests and was diagnosed with Lois-Dietz syndrome. Loeys-Dietz syndrome is a disease that affects connective tissue in various parts of the body, increasing the risk of vascular problems such as aortic dissection. According to the National Library of Medicine. the study Studies have also shown that people with this syndrome may be at higher risk of developing an aortic dissection during pregnancy.
The diagnosis will require Banik to undergo additional tests and require further treatment, but for now she is alive and able to watch her 8-month-old “miraculous” daughter grow. He said he was happy.
“I've been dreaming these past few days, and they're very precious,” Banik said, adding that the diagnosis meant she would never be able to give birth again. She said, “I don't take a single day for granted. Every day is like a holiday for us. I just cherish each day.”
