Although she was able to stop using stimulants for the benefit of her unborn child and had a comparatively uneventful pregnancy, the harm that the stimulants had caused to Mandi’s body had already been done.
As the mother entered labor, she began to experience excruciating chest pain, and throughout her dramatic hospital stay, her heart stopped twice.
Mandi’s heart was under a lot of strain since she was abusing the ADHD medication and not taking her insulin as prescribed to manage her type 1 diabetes.
“Everything was just eating at my heart pretty much, and then when I went into labour my heart just blew out,” said the mother. “I knew I was telling my mother, ‘Something’s not right, when I went into labor.
“I told the physicians that I had overused narcotics when they asked if I had taken anything, and they essentially claimed that I had blew out my heart.
“Going into labour and putting the stress on it on top of the condition that it was in, it couldn’t handle the stress of the pregnancy.”
