CINCINNATI (WKRC) — Just one week after getting the COVID-19 vaccine, an Indiana woman says she could barely walk or talk. The sad part, she says, is her illness might have been avoided if she had simply known to have an important conversation with her doctor first.
Just a few months after being crowned a champion cowboy mounted shooter, Ginger Mitchell couldn’t even stand up.
She was admitted to the hospital about 10 days after getting the vaccine. Doctors initially thought she had a stroke, but after dozens of tests, they realized that wasn't the case.
They called a neurologist, and he recognized it right away as Guillain-Barré,” said Mitchell.
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Months later, as she continues to rehabilitate at her home in Indiana, she credits that medical team and those prayers with giving her back a feeling of hope.
While most people do recover from Guillain-Barré, Mitchell says, “there were a lot of hopeless moments in the hospital."
Preliminary research does show a rare association of Guillain-Barré with the COVID-19 vaccines, but Fichtenbaum says it's important to remember:
The risk of getting COVID and becoming sick is much greater when you look at the raw numbers."
He also says there is no evidence of higher incidences of Guillain-Barré with coronavirus vaccine than with other vaccines.
Mitchell, however, may have been at higher risk for it, but didn’t know it,
“I’ve had an autoimmune disease for a long time, for 20 years. It’s called interstitial cystitis,” said Mitchell.
“It may be that in certain people, if you rev up their immune system in response to an infection or vaccination, that may lead them to develop Guillain-Barré for reasons that we still don’t quite understand,” said Fitchtenbaum.
Mitchell says if she had known that if you have an autoimmune disease, you might be at higher risk for this association between vaccines and Guillain-Barré, she would've consulted her doctor first.
Maybe I would have had a conversation with my doctor to say, 'Is this something I should do?'” said Mitchell. “Maybe the doctor still would have said, 'Yes, it’s better to have the vaccine and have protection,' or not, but we'll really never know.”
Mitchell and her husband, David, are sharing her story to remind everyone that any preexisting condition should be discussed with your own healthcare provider before vaccination.
I dont real gaslighting. I see them saying they should have been told about this risk, but they are trying not to make it sound like a blame, so they are saying it very low key. Probably the only reason this made it to main stream.