Woman Addicted To Energy Drinks Ends Up Requiring Emergency Surgery At The Hospital
Energy drinks are some people’s go-to when life demands more than what they can provide at times. We’ve all heard that life has a tendency to throw lemons at us at random points in time and while some of us learn to make lemonade (read: deal with it) others find it difficult to handle challenges and that’s not their fault. We all have different energy levels when it comes to handling situations under pressure. Meet 33-years-old working mom of three Samantha Sharpe who lives in Leicester in the U.K. Like most parents, Sharpe works hard to support her family and after hours she’s busy looking after her children.
It’s obvious that by the end of the day working as a barmaid Sharpe is exhausted and in desperate need of something that’ll instantly give her the energy she needs to fulfill her role as a doting mother. Looking for some sort of a quick fix, she immediately grabs a can of energy drink and devours it without a pause. Guess what? She instantly begins to feel better, energized and ready to head home to spend some quality time with her kids. Why does she start feeling better? Well, theoretically speaking, one can of energy drink contains approximately 37 grams of sugar and about 80 milligrams of caffeine.
In 2014 Sharpe began chugging down six cans of energy drinks per day in order to maintain a balance between her busy professional and personal life. This means that Sharpe was consuming 222 grams of sugar and 480 milligrams of caffeine per day – a dangerous recipe for definite health problems. According to the British Nutrition Foundation, women should have no more than 27 grams of sugar per day; Sharpe was ingesting over nine times the recommended amount of sugar per day. Life was smooth for four years, she hardly felt exhausted – it was like she had everything in control, but things changed. Her health took a nosedive.
In February 2018 Sharpe’s habit of six cans per day caught up with her, sending her straight to the emergency room. Sharpe noticed that the drinks made her heart race and caused palpitations. If she skipped drinking a can, her heart rate would drop to a meager 20 beats per minute, giving her nasty headaches. Sharpe had to chug down can after can in order to feel alive because the thought of going to sleep made her extremely nervous. It was clear that she was addicted to energy drinks. Soon Sharpe began fainting at home and that’s when doctors told her that her first-degree heart blockage had extended to second-degree.
She had to undergo emergency surgery at the Glenfield Hospital to have a pacemaker fitted into her heart through a vein in her leg – an extremely painful procedure to help her heart function. Not only was Sharpe close to developing type 2 diabetes, she even had to battle kidney stones because of her energy drink addiction. Sharpe stopped drinking energy drinks and with the help of the pacemaker, life soon returned to normal. Then one day she drank just one can. Her heart immediately began racing, her kidneys started hurting and she began experiencing a throbbing headache. Experiencing the damage energy drinks can make first-hand, she vowed never to touch one ever again.
