A man tragically died from a flesh-eating bug after discovering a spot on his leg and suffering hallucinations.
Brett Dymond, 38, died on Mother’s Day last month after contracting sepsis from necrotising fasciitis - a flesh eating infection he may have caught from gardening or working in his garage.
He went to work as normal after finding the spot which had started to swell but his condition deteriorated on March 16.
The dad of two, from west London, went into hospital after his wife Charlene had been advised to do so having called 111, said his family, with his cousin Kelly Sims, saying at this point he was in good spirits.
"He came in laughing and joking,” Kelly told MyLondon. "All the staff were really fond of him because he was so funny and nice.
"One male nurse said to me they kind of bonded because they had a lot of things in common and he was just making him laugh.”
But doctors found that he had sepsis and he was put in an induced coma as well given kidney dialysis.
His situation deteriorated with reportedly one of the worst cases of sepsis that the intensive care unit had seen in five years.
"He had two cardiac arrests that evening, which did some damage to his heart. They resuscitated him and he was still in a coma asleep, but he was really, really fragile,” said Kelly.
"A few things made it look like he was going get better and then the following day, Saturday, he had another cardiac arrest.”
The family were told that if he survived he would lose his fingers and legs due to a lack of blood supply but then later they were told that he was brain dead.
"That evening, his pupils started to dilate,” Kelly said, “that is like a key sign that he had gone brain dead. They had to take him to have a CT scan and what's happened with his brain.”
The family was given the awful news his brainstem was dead the following day and took the heart-wrenching decision to switch off the life support machine on Mother's Day.
"That was awful for me as well because I've got two young children and was celebrating Mother's Day. We did not expect him to go like that. It was so sudden,” Kelly said.
Now to help the family, Kelly has set up a fundraising page for Charlene and his two children Reiss, 16, and Tommy, 2.
She said: "I went in to see Brett at the end up in the hospital and one of the things I said to him was ‘I promise I'm going to help look after Charlene, Reiss and Tommy and make sure they're comfortable.
"I just want you to know that they're not here on their own. I'm going to make sure I can do everything I to make this all easier for them.’ That's why I decided I wanted to do the GoFundMe.”
