Emily Niespodziany is 40, an age at which many people feel the first tugs of mortality: a sore elbow after a tennis game or the first mention of health screenings by a doctor.
But sometimes, reminders of our mortality arrive abruptly, like a stranger pounding on your front door.
That’s what happened to Niespodziany. Her wake-up call was sudden and scary.
Niespodziany, chief development officer at Erlanger Medical Center, was relatively new to her job and in the middle of promoting the biggest fundraising event of her year at Erlanger when she first got sick. In the space of a few days in April 2025, Niespodziany held her breath as a simple stomach ache morphed into a life-or-death situation.
One night, while struggling with abdominal pain, she turned to her husband and said, “I think I need to go to the emergency room.”