When Jane Haley took a course of antibiotics for her strep throat in June, she quickly started feeling back to her normal self.

The 41-year-old had no idea that, just two months later on August 24, she would be rushed to hospital in an ambulance where doctors would diagnose her with Toxic Shock Syndrome – a rare form of sepsis.

Ultimately, doctors would have to amputate all four of her limbs to save her life from the tissue damage, and keep her from multi-organ failure.

Pictures reveal the severe damage to her legs and arms from the Group A Streptococcus infection which spiralled out of control, as Jane thinks back to how her journey started.

‘In June I took a full course of antibiotics for seven to 10 days and I was feeling better by then,’ Jane, an accountant, recalls.

‘Towards the end of August I started to have pain in my jaw and cheek and then in the left side of my neck. I thought it was just my glands swelling up to take care of an infection or whatever was happening in my jaw.’

But after calling a medical advice helpline and explaining her symptoms, Jane, from Grande Prairie, Alberta, was rushed to hospital in an ambulance.

‘That was the last thing I remember,’ she says. ‘One minute I was fine and the next minute I wasn’t fine and I was rushed to ICU.’

Her blood pressure and heart rate dramatically dropped and she was placed into a medically induced coma, which allowed doctors to diagnose her with Group A Streptococcus, which had progressed into Toxic Shock Syndrome.

As her condition worsened, her hands and feet began to go black from the tissue damage, and doctors told her she would lose all four limbs – a sad reality for Jane, who loved sports.

She had always been drawn to the outdoors and adventure, often hiking, rollerblading and paddleboarding, but now she can’t partake in any of the activities she loves.

‘It was either save my life or save my limbs and the doctors chose to save my life,’ she explains. ‘I’m happy that they made this decision as I’m still here to talk about it today.’

That doesn’t mean it was easy for Jane to come to terms with, though. ‘It was devastating at the time to see my hands,’ she adds. ‘My feet hadn’t changed colour at the time so I had a bit of hope that I would still walk.

‘It took only two weeks for my hands to look how they looked in the photos, it happened rapidly.’

Just over a month after arriving at hospital, on September 29, Jane was airlifted to a second hospital, where she underwent her double hand amputation on October 1.

A week-and-a-half later she had her legs amputated below the knee, and then went in for a third surgery a week later to restore the nerve connections to her muscles.

‘I was desperate to go [for the amputation] as by the time this came around I was in so much pain,’ Jane says.

‘It was disgusting that the bottom of my foot was black and it looked almost like an insole. The dead skin was separating from the old skin, the pain was constant.

‘It started out as a little crater [on my foot] and this got bigger and bigger [until the dead skin] could flap at me when I flexed my foot. It was so extremely painful that I thought anything had to be better than this. I was ready to go and get this amputated.’

Now, Jane is in a rehabilitation facility in Edmonton to begin her long road to recovery where she will receive physical and mental health therapy.

In the future, with the help of prosthetics, she hopes to drive, run and swim again, but sadly says her days of climbing mountains are over.

To help with her recovery, a family member has set up a GoFundMe page to raise funds for her rehabilitation expenses.

Jane is now raising awareness of how serious her infection turned out to be as she claims it ‘could have happened to anyone’.

‘All I’m doing now is I’m in survival mode and I’m looking forward [to my future],’ she admits. ‘I’m happy to be living each day and approaching things that people take for granted every day.

‘I’ve had several moments where I’ve broken down but I think for the most part I am a strong person. I don’t like to look back and say “what if?”

‘If I put myself in this mindset it brings down my whole day.’

Jane thinks most people aren’t aware of Strep and how ‘scary’ septic shock is.

‘This could have happened to anyone and it’s a silent killer. It’s a miracle I was on the way to the hospital, as this could have happened at home,’ she adds.

‘I want people to be more aware of what this is and how serious it can be. If this reaches out to people and even saves just one life, it’s worth it.’

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