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Oops!



That’s what most people say when they realize they’ve left a tampon in for a little longer than advised, but when British student Emily Pankhurst realized it had been nine days, a trip to the emergency room was required.

“When I finally realized the tampon was in me and I pulled it out it was pure black. It was obviously coated in bacteria. I wouldn’t have known what it was apart from the string. It was horrible,” she said in an interview with the Press Association.

The young student had been studying for exams when she started experiencing bloating and bloody discharge. She was finally rushed to the hospital after her mother noticed she was slurring her words and could see she was becoming faint.

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Pankhurst claims the entire thing was an accident.



“I blamed deadlines, returning to uni after the New Year and exams,” she said.

Like a lot of university students, Pankhurst was stressed out and absentmindedly inserted a tampon forgetting she already had one in, which pushed the first one out out of sight – and out of mind. It wasn’t until she started experiencing the symptoms of toxic shock syndrome that she remembered what she had done.

ALSO SEE: A model who lost her leg to toxic shock syndrome walked the runway in a gold prosthetic

Pankhurst spent three days in intensive care, temporarily losing mobility. While she still feels ill and struggles to walk long distances, she knows that she’s one of the lucky ones. In 2012, model Lauren Wasser lost her leg from toxic shock syndrome and others have lost their lives.

Since sharing her story, Pankhurst has been inundated with questions of how. She claims it was a stressful time and that it could have happened to anyone. She hopes her story will help raise awareness and prevent others from having this painful experience.

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