When Steven Spinale was given a four percent chance of survival after contracting sepsis back in 2022, his friends and family were plunged into their worst nightmare.
Little did they know, however, that their agonising experience was soon to be made even more unbearable by a pack of internet trolls, who've been mocking their turmoil with a series of TikTok comments.
The Spinale family's devastation began two years ago, after American father Steven, then 36, pulled out a pesky ingrown hair that had been irritating his groin region. But he was suddenly taken ill within a matter of days.
According to Steven's friends and family - including his sister Michelle, who has been sharing her brother's health battle on TikTok from the very beginning - this preliminary sickness lasted for around a month.
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She claimed doctors were seemingly unable to determine what had impacted his health so dramatically, alleging he was 'turned away' from numerous hospitals, who thought Steven was 'making it up'.
"He started vomiting blood and they still sent him home," a heartbroken Michelle previously told her followers.
During his final assessment, however, medical staff eventually determined that he was 'bleeding internally from somewhere'.
And while that chilling thought may have sent shivers down your spine, according to Michelle, this bleeding was the 'smallest' of all the family's worries.
Doctors found that Steven had a 'rare bacteria', which was 'ravaging through his body and shutting down his organs'.
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He was officially diagnosed with sepsis (blood poisoning), before suffering a number of subsequent life-threatening ailments, including influenza A and double pneumonia.
Medics then made the difficult decision to place Steven into a medically-induced coma, after which they tragically informed his family that he had only a four percent chance of survival.
After the sepsis reached his heart, he suffered a 'small stroke', according to Michelle, and was forced to undergo open heart surgery.
Miraculously, after remaining in a coma for a month, Steven awoke, having suffered no signs of brain damage at all.
Since then, Michelle has shared regularly updates over her brother's turbulent health.
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A few months after he woke up from his coma, she gushed over her 'amazing' brother being able to 'sit up on his own', describing the 'new sparkle' he has in his eyes after proving 'doctors wrong'.
That said, however, the Spinale's road to recovery hasn't been made any easier by a small group of vicious social media users, who have taken it upon themselves to troll the family.
In a harrowing revelation, Michelle this week publicly outed one of her trolls for a hateful comment on one of her videos, which read: "Hope your bro joins yur pops".
She wrote back to slam the user, however, sharing a series of videos from Steven's brave recovery.
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"What a nasty comment knowing our father is not alive. I sure hope you never are in this kind of situation," Michelle hit back.
"Seems you may need more prayers than my brother though because you must be battling something really awful inside to say a comment like that."
If you'd like to donate to Steven's GoFundMe, click here.
Featured Image Credit: GoFundMeTopics: Health, News, US News, World News, Social Media