Quadruple amputee Kentucky nurse Cindy Mullins shows off her new ‘prototype arm’ and ‘pink sparkly legs’ in health update

A Kentucky mother-of-two who lost all four of her limbs is in good spirits and has recently showed off her new prosthetic arms and legs.

Cindy Mullins, a nurse, had her arms and legs amputated in January after a kidney stone infection turned them septic.

Months after the surgery that changed her life forever, Mullins, 41, called last Friday ‘a big day’ in her life because of her new prototype arm.

In a photo posted to her GoFundMe page, which has now raised over $333,000, she is seen smiling as she wears a black prosthetic on her right arm for the first time. A second photo shows her grabbing a pamphlet at an orthopedics office.

On the same day, she was also outfitted with new legs. In one photo, doctors are helping her walk with the prosthetics.

‘I never thought I would be so happy to have pink sparkly legs,’ she wrote. 

Mullins has been preparing training herself to use prosthetics since early March.

‘As if she wasn’t strong enough, she’s about to get stronger. We just checked in to Cardinal Hill for a couple weeks of intense therapy to prepare her for the prosthetic journey she is about to begin,’ her husband DJ wrote in a March 8 post.

Mullins originally went into treatment for kidney stones, which are hard balls of salt and minerals that form inside the body.

The doctor left a temporary stent in her body following the surgery to prevent blockage. When she removed the stent at home as she was instructed, the mother of two began to feel ill and passed out.

She was hurried to a local hospital, where doctors discovered that an unremoved kidney stone had become infected.

Mullins was told that she had gone into septic shock, with her organs beginning to shut down. She was stabilized and placed on a ventilator before she was taken to a larger hospital in Lexington, Kentucky.

Over the next several days, her organ function improved, but soon, blisters broke out across her limbs. When she regained consciousness, doctors told her that she would survive the infection – at the expense of her hands and legs.

She underwent a series of amputations concluding with the removal of her lower arms in February.

‘I just want people to know this is not a sad story,’ Mullins told DailyMail.com in early February. ‘This has a happy ending. I’m alive. I get to be with my children and my husband.’

Following hours of grueling physical therapy sessions, Mullins regained her ability to eat by herself using a specially adapted fork strapped to her arm.

She also learned to sit upright by herself and scroll on her phone using her nose.

Still, her husband DJ and her two sons have had to adapt in the months following Mullins’ quadruple amputation. 

Each morning, DJ must dress and wrap his wife’s wounds to keep them clean and watertight.

The 41-year-old mom has said that she is determined to go back to work when’s she at as a certified medical assistant when she’s ready.

The GoFundMe campaign was organized by a close friend, Heather Beshears, and has turned into a journal documenting Mullins’ recovery.

‘Cindy and her family will have to make a few adjustments to their home to accommodate Cindy’s needs as well as her prosthetics and adaptive equipment,’ Beshears wrote on the page.

‘The costs of all of this can be overwhelming. We started this fundraiser because we want to support our hero Cindy, as well as her husband DJ who has been by her side every step of the way.’