'Like the cat with 9 lives': 91-year-old Sumter woman defeats brain tumor, COVID-19 and host of health complications in 6 months

Knowing her mother loves to wear lip gloss when she has company, Gigi Gilbert patted a bold pink color onto the 91-year-old's lips before asking her to show her teeth so she could wipe the excess gloss off them and from around the corners of her mouth.

Ruthell Muldrow never imagined she'd need her youngest daughter's help with a simple task like putting on lip gloss. She was independent still at 91 with the energy of a 70-year-old. It took brain surgery, a collapsed lung, a fall and COVID-19 for doctors to advise her to slow down.

After a six-month road to recovery, Muldrow finally returned home on Oct. 4. After all she had been through, the craziest thing was she didn't remember a thing about why she needed to recover in the first place. Her own children had to explain to her what happened in those six months.

About five years ago, Muldrow started radiation treatment for a tumor on the left side of her brain, she said. The radiation was meant to keep the tumor from growing, but it didn't seem to help.

Muldrow had to make the decision to either have surgery on March 30 or wait until the coronavirus pandemic passed, but she wanted it over with.

"She was all in for the surgery because the pain was just so bad," said Carmen Stewart, Muldrow's oldest daughter. Plus, there was no telling when the pandemic would end.

The surgery was a success, but complications followed soon after, which the doctor had warned the family about.

Muldrow experienced a blood stroke, which paralyzed her right side, and she stopped breathing twice. Her left lung collapsed at one point after being put on a respirator.

Her family wasn't worried. Her children knew their mother was a strong woman.

"Everything like that was so serious that could have literally just taken her out," Gilbert said. "She just got through all of that, and we were like, 'Wow, she's like the cat with nine lives.'"

Her mother started progressing toward rehab by April 16 from Prisma Health Richland to NHC Parklane Rehabilitation Center, Gilbert said. However, therapy to recover her paralyzed right side, speech and brain had to wait a little longer after Muldrow experienced more health complications.

According to Stewart, Muldrow got an infection, passed out at rehab and ended up back at the hospital. Soon after, she fell out of her wheelchair because she thought she could stand up on her own.

Muldrow told her caretakers she hit the left side of her head during the fall, which was the side she got surgery on. She had to go back to the hospital, again, but when she returned to rehab, she started showing symptoms of COVID-19 and tested positive.

When she returned to the hospital for COVID-19 treatment, the doctors were ready to set Muldrow up with a respirator, Stewart said. They imagined it would be a difficult recovery for her, but she ended up not needing it.

Muldrow recovered from COVID-19 with little to no difficulties, even though she still hadn't received speech therapy and was still paralyzed on her right side.

"She just bounced back from that," Stewart said.

Once Muldrow tested negative for COVID-19 twice, she went back to rehab in July to finally start therapy.

It took a while for her to rehabilitate mobility in her right leg and arm, but she recovered faster than expected and surprised doctors with her health, energy and spirit.

"I didn't know anything about it," Muldrow said.

She never recalled having her surgery or why she was going back and forth from hospital and rehab.

During all those months, Muldrow had the mindset that she could move independently. Nurses even had to put signs up all over her room telling her not to get out of the bed without assistance, according to her family.

The one thing Muldrow could recall in that blurry time was spending time with her doctors and listening to them say how great she looked after everything she's been through. She never knew what they were talking about. She just followed orders throughout those six months, never questioning her doctors.

It wasn't until last week when she understood what she went through in those six months, after her children told her.

"She didn't remember any of it," Gilbert said. "She's still trying to remember that she actually had the surgery for her brain this year."

Because she doesn't remember her surgery or getting sick, Muldrow is constantly reminded that she needs to take it easy and that she can't live her independent lifestyle like before.

Luckily, she has family to care for her.

Once she got home, Muldrow was surprised to have all her children in Sumter. Gilbert is working remotely from Atlanta, Georgia; Stewart and her husband, Greg, came all the way from San Antonio, Texas, to be with their mother; and her oldest son, Norman, is right next door, visiting every day.

Gilbert said having her mother home for recovery is what she's been waiting for the past six months, and it's even better because the whole family is working together as a team to support her.

"We all got through it with a lot of prayer, faith and hope," Gilbert said. "It was nothing short of a miracle."

"She has defied so much already, so our expectation, our prayer, is that she is going to make great strides," Stewart said, talking about her mother's journey to recovery.

She has made progress in her journey so far, but she does still have a long way to go.

According to Stewart, it will take about a year or so until her mother fully recovers, even though she's been making great progress in just one week of being home.

She's back to doing her favorite activity - walking - thanks to the help of her children, but she wants to get back on the road.

Muldrow has made it her personal goal to get back behind the wheel and be the social butterfly she is, but until then, Muldrow will be leaving her Sumter home temporarily to live with Gilbert in Atlanta for the rest of her recovery.

"I'll miss my home," Muldrow said, "but I feel good about that because I'll be in the care of my youngest daughter, Gigi."

Gilbert said they'll be going back and forth between Sumter and Atlanta so Muldrow can be at the home she built from the ground up, see her Sumter friends and visit her church, Second Presbyterian Church.

Muldrow's children were amazed by their mother's experience and the doctors and nurses who kept their mother's spirit alive after surviving the unimaginable.

Gilbert hopes her mother's story can be an inspiration.

"If she can get through all of that in the midst of everything that's going on, what are we having to be worried or fearful about?" Gilbert said.

While her children were more worried about her health, Muldrow was more excited to be home and have her favorite food: coconut pie and butter pecan ice cream.

"The first thing she ate when she got home," Gilbert said, laughing. "Before she had any dinner."