A mother has warned of the dangers of energy drinks after she was forced to turn off her daughter’s life support machine in 2021.
Lori Barranon has explained how her ‘workout queen’ daughter tragically passed away from a heart attack which she believes was caused by her drinking energy drinks.
The mum shared how daughter Katie Donnell, 28, unexpectedly suffered the heart attack while out with friends, before she the spent 10 days on life support.
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The 63-year-old was then left with no other option but to make the 'horrible' decision to switch off life support, ending her daughter’s life.
Before her death, Katie was the 'epitome of health' and didn’t have any known underlying conditions, so she took caffeine products every day to help her with her workouts.
Lori said: "She would start with a pre-workout before she went to work to supposedly wake up or she went to the gym and did cardio at five in the morning.
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"I didn't realise how much she was drinking until after she passed. Her boyfriend said she would buy a four-pack every two to three days.
"Not to mention she was drinking a lot of coffee and doing the pre-workout.
"One of her friends said she'd hardly see Katie without an energy drink in her hands. When I cleaned out her car after she passed it was full of cans, at least three or four in there.”
However, Katie had gone to the GP for 'horrible anxiety', which is something her mother thinks was caused by her excess consumption of energy products.
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Lori shared that her daughter drank up to three energy drinks every day, drank ‘a lot of’ coffee and took an energy-enhancing supplement before doing her exercises.
This has led her to believe that her daughter's 'abuse' of these caffeinated products triggered her heart attack.
Katie died on 9 August 2021, and now Lori is warning people of the dangers of energy drink consumption.
According to Healthline, drinking too many of these drinks can cause cardiovascular issues, which include heart arrhythmias and even heart attacks.
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As the recommended daily dose of caffeine is 400mg for adults, drinking more can cause caffeine toxicity.
Lori, from Florida said: "I was shocked. I knew I hated [energy drinks] but I didn't know they could be deadly.
"She was out with friends and her eyes rolled back and she was staring. They thought she had a stroke but they realised she was having a heart attack.
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"The ambulance got there and couldn't intubate her. She was without oxygen for too long and it caused brain damage.
"They worked on her for three hours and she never woke up. The neuro surgeon came in and thought she was on drugs or was 'roofied' [spiked] or something.”
Lori continued: "She was left for 10 days in a medically induced coma but she never woke up.
"Whenever she tried to wake up she was having seizures. Then her body started to fail, we had to do that horrible thing that nobody wants to do.
"At 28, you just don't see people dropping dead of a heart attack.
"She was a workout queen, she ate real clean, she ate organic food, she was the epitome of health other than [having energy drinks].”
Sadly, she explained how the ‘doctors said they see this happen a lot with people that do a lot of pre-workout or energy drinks but they wouldn't give the cause of death to that’.
Lori said: "If you don't keep your kids away from this stuff you may be in my situation where your life is ruined. It's so harmful and deadly, my whole family is affected by this.”
She added: "I think energy drinks should be banned."
Topics: Health, Food and Drink
Britt Jones