CODY, Wyo. - For the first time, a Wyoming woman is speaking publicly about how her life changed on New Year's Eve.
Kailey Kline was ringing in the new year at a Cody bar when suddenly she began having seizures and couldn't move.
Watch the full video of this story below:
The 23-year-old was flown by emergency helicopter to Billings and spent more than three days on a ventilator with doctors believing she was drugged.
The incident began when Kline, along with family and friends, came to the Silver Dollar Bar for a New Year's Eve celebration.
She wasn't feeling well when she left to go home.
She says she was not inebriated, but she thinks somebody may have put something in her drink.
Her fiancé noticed problems and called the paramedics, who responded to their home.
“So simply if my fiancé had put me to bed that night thinking that I was just really drunk, I would have died,” Kline said.
The ordeal put Kline in the hospital, where she was in a coma for several days. She is still recovering.
“It was very life-changing, and my health still has a ways to go,” Kline said. “I have to do two more procedures in two weeks."
She does not normally go to bars, but her fiancé encouraged her to enjoy the time with the girls.
Kline had asked someone in her party to keep track of her drink.
“I stepped off the dance floor with this individual who was bringing me my drink,” said Kline. “And it wasn't the friend that I had asked to watch my drink.”
She says she began to feel sick and was not able to stand or talk.
“So I just sat there for a little longer and ultimately was terrifying because I felt like I was burning from the inside out,” she said.
Paramedics did what they could, took her to the hospital in Cody, and she was later flown to St. Vincent Regional Hospital in Billings.
"So I was telling by mom, OK, let's go home like,” Kline said. "Why are you guys sitting there. I’m awake now. And she was like, you're very weak, you need to relax like you can't walk, you can't get up."
The Cody Police Department can neither prove nor disprove that something was put in her drink, but Kline says she was given medication to help with antifreeze poisoning.
“They had given me the Antizol antidote for antifreeze,” Kline said. “That antidote was pretty much their last call. We’re just going to hope that this works basically because they didn't know what was wrong with me. They said that that is the most likely cause. Yes.”
She and her friends have a strong suspicion of who did it, but she would not give details because she does not want to harm the investigation.
The Cody Police have finished their investigation and will comment after the county attorney decides what to do with the case.
"I'm just hoping and praying that everything works out the way that it should be and then I make a full recovery,” said Kline.
And she tells her story hoping to save others from what she experienced.
"There are predators out there that watch,” Kline said. “Make sure your drink is at your head at all times and make sure that you are the one that buys your drink and you watch it being made and grab it from the bartender directly.”
Donations to help Kline's recover can be sent to a Venmo account.
