12-Year-Old Spent 22 Days in Coma with Brain-Eating Amoeba from Swimming. She Tells Story of Survival (Exclusive)

Mar. 15, 2025

Kali Hardig near Little Rock, Ark., in October 2013.Photo:Danny Johnston/AP

Danny Johnston/AP

In July 2013, just like summers before, 12-year-old Kali Hardig went swimming at Willow Springs Water Park in Little Rock, Ark., near where she was growing up.

However, once she returned home that July day, she complained to mom Traci that she had a headache — but little did Kali and her family know that what started out as a mild irritation would turn into a near-fatal ordeal due to a rarebrain-eating amoeba.

Here,years after the headlines, Kali, now a 23-year-old secretary in Illinois and a mom to 1-year-old daughter Adalynn,tells her story of survival to PEOPLE’sDanielle Jenningsin her own words.

I had been swimming all summer long at this same location. That day, I accidentally fell into the water while playing and water went up my nose. I didn’t seem to notice anything that day, just that when we got home I had a slight headache, and mom just told me to go to sleep, that I had been in the sun and that I needed sleep, so I went to bed.

The next morning the headache was worse, so mom told me to just go back to sleep for a while and she would check on me soon.

When she came back, my headache had gotten tremendously worse and I also had a very high fever. If I remember correctly, it was like 104.3 degrees, so mom moved me out to the couch where she gave me Motrin — and I immediately started projectile vomiting.

Kali Hardig before being released from the hospital in September 2013.Danny Johnston/AP

If my mom would not have been there to help hold my head up, I would have died then because I had no strength to lift my head to keep from aspirating on the vomit. My mom knew, when I couldn’t hold my head up to puke and my eyes were rolling back because I was so out of it, that something was very wrong with me.

She called my dad to tell him that I was very sick and that she was taking me to Arkansas Children’s Hospital.

I was taken to the ER in the afternoon. They tried to just tell my mom I had the flu because I was complaining of a sore neck, sensitivity to light, vomiting and high fever, but my mom being who she is, she kept pushing and telling them that it wasn’t just the flu, that I was very sick and that I had never acted like this before.

They then went to start an IV. I’m deathly scared of needles, but this is how my mom knew I was very sick because I didn’t flinch or even cry.

After that, my dad had arrived at the hospital and they were telling my parents that they thought I could have meningitis because of the neck pain and sensitivity to the light. My dad asked, “How do we find that out?” and the doctor said the only way to know for sure is to do a spinal tap, so that’s what was done.

To give you a better picture of how much I was out of it, they had to do my spinal tap twice because the first time they didn’t get any fluid and I didn’t move normally. I would [usually] be screaming and crying, but I was so out of it that I didn’t care.

Once the spinal fluid was sent down to the lab, we got the results and that’s when the ER doctor took my parents into a separate room to tell them what was actually wrong with me: I had a very rare brain-eating amoeba calledprimary amebic meningoencephalitis.

They did not tell me at that time, they just told me I was very sick and needed to fight. I found out later that they gave me a 1% survival rate and said if I did survive, I would be in a wheelchair. I had never heard of [the amoeba] nor had anyone in my family.

I was in rehab for about a month. The one thing I struggled with the most was walking. I couldn’t lift my toes up when I walked, so I would trip. They made me wear special inserts that went under my feet in my shoes and wrapped around the backs of my calves to lift my toes when I walked so I didn’t trip anymore.

Kali Hardig (right) with her daughter, Adalynn.Kali Hardig

Kali Hardig

Another part of my rehab was getting back in the water. But after mom and dad told me how I got sick, I did not want anything to do with water — I wouldn’t even take a shower. I was so scared, so at therapy they started working with me at easing me into the pool at Children’s.

After I finished rehab at the hospital and got sent home, I didn’t return to school right away, I went to a brain injury camp where I still went to therapy every day and also started back working on school work at the camp.

They helped me get back to the same educational level that I needed to be at to return to school. I later returned to my normal school after Christmas break.

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My advice to parents and children to avoid suffering from the same condition is always make sure your child either physically plugs their nose when jumping in the water or, to just be even safer, have them wear a nose plug when playing in any type of water.

As a mom now, my child will always know to plug her nose when jumping into the water. But as of right now, she only swims in pools that are chemically treated.

source: people.com