Jackie Bachteler's Inspiring Return to Coaching After Life-Threatening Sepsis

On Sunday at Turf Moor, as Burnley walk out to face Sunderland in the Women's Championship at 14:00 BST, their manager will take a moment before she steps into the technical area.

Nine months ago, Jackie Bachteler thought she would never stand there at all.

From dream move to intensive care

The American coach arrived from San Diego in December 2025, buzzing for a new chapter. Burnley had brought her in to work with the women's first team and the men's academy – a dual role, a big responsibility, exactly the kind of challenge a 37-year-old, ambitious coach craves.

Within three weeks, her life was in danger.

What she first dismissed as jet lag and a heavy cold turned into something far more sinister. One morning at the training ground, the room suddenly started spinning. She stepped outside for air but could barely breathe.

She knew instantly this was different. This was serious.

She called for the club doctor. The men's team doctor, who happened to be on site, checked her over. Her blood pressure crashed. Her oxygen levels were dangerously low. An ambulance run to A&E followed, and with it, a creeping sense of dread.

"To be honest, I thought I was going to die. I just had this feeling in my body like 'this is it'. I knew something was wrong," she told BBC Sport.

At first, she received treatment for her lungs and was almost sent home. Her instincts told her to push back. She asked for more tests.

That decision saved her life.

Her blood pressure plummeted again. She became so dizzy she could not walk. Confusion set in. Blotches appeared on her skin. A blood test result triggered an immediate response – four or five doctors sprinting towards her, IV lines going in, fluids, antibiotics, an oxygen mask strapped on.

The diagnosis: sepsis. A life-threatening reaction to infection that can shut down the body in hours.

Alone, afraid, and fighting

Bachteler was moved into intensive care. For a couple of days, her blood was tested every 20 minutes. Her organs were monitored constantly. This was survival mode.

Her family were thousands of miles away in the United States. Her wife, based in Finland, was grounded by a snowstorm. No one could get to her.

She lay in a hospital bed in a new country, unsure exactly what was happening inside her body, with no familiar face at her side.

"On my third day in hospital, I tried to stand up and I couldn't. The nurses told me not to walk and when you hear that it's a bit of an alarm bell," she said.

The routine became relentless: lung treatment after lung treatment, bag after bag of fluids, round after round of antibiotics. She needed help just to get to the bathroom.

"It was close to when you face your mortality. It just gives you another perspective on life."

When she was finally discharged, the battle was only half-won. She had to learn to walk again. Coaching, tactics, training plans – all of it had to wait. Burnley would not see her back at the club until July, when she returned as the new women's team manager.

Living with the aftermath

The infection has gone, but sepsis has left its mark.

Bachteler lives with post-sepsis syndrome. Dizzy spells. Extreme fatigue. Mental fog. Memory lapses. Tremors when she pushes herself too far. Her nervous system is still trying to reset.

Even pre-season brought a stark reminder. During a friendly a few weeks ago, the sun beat down on the dugout. The heat caught up with her.

"It was so hot with the sun facing the bench. I got up in the second half and it was like when you have too much wine, you get up and you're like, 'woah!'

"I was just so dizzy. I gave the instruction, talked to the team and then I went to the cafe on site and said to them: 'Can I sit in your freezer?'

"I just needed to calm down. Then I started crying because my nervous system is still recovering and it's just been really, really hard."

She estimates she is at "70 to 80% Jackie again". The rest, she hopes, will come with time, therapy and patience.

She continues respiratory work to strengthen her lungs. The dizzy spells remain unpredictable. Fatigue can hit suddenly and brutally. When she overreaches, her body shakes.

And yet, she is back on the grass. Back coaching. Back leading.

Held up by a club – and a family

Through it all, Bachteler points to one constant: Burnley’s support.

She says the club doctors "saved her life". They refused to dismiss her concerns, pushed for answers, and later connected her with a respiratory specialist. The coaching staff around her have picked up extra responsibilities. She calls them "phenomenal".

Players have sent messages, checked in, and adjusted as she delegates more. The club, in her words, has given her the space and backing to recover at her own pace.

Her family have tried to do the same, even as they wrestle with their own fear.

She remembers a day in May, when her parents finally flew over from the US. They went for Sunday dinner. The restaurant was loud, busy. Her head started to spin.

"We went for Sunday dinner and it was loud. I just got so dizzy and they could see it. As we were walking back, I was shaking and I didn't know where I was," she said.

"They started crying, both of them. I think it was even harder for them. I get emotional any time I talk about my family with this.

"When my wife was able to see me [in hospital], she just started crying because of the amount of weight I lost.

"I'm really athletic and I'm really fit, but then I wasn't able to walk. She had to hold me up going down the stairs."

These are the images that linger: a coach known for her energy and fitness reduced to clinging to a banister, supported by the person she loves.

Football, reframed

All of this has changed how she sees the game.

"I'm definitely in a good way though. I'm about 70 to 80% Jackie again and that's thanks to the club, the doctors here and the NHS - but it was close.

"If I had gone home that day when the emergency room tried to send me back, I wouldn't be sitting here today."

Defeats still hurt. They always will. But they no longer carry the same weight.

"A loss is a loss. I really believe in what I'm doing and in the people that I'm doing it with. Now the worst thing that will happen is that we lose a game," she said.

Perspective like that doesn’t just appear. It is forged in hospital corridors, in 3am alarms for blood tests, in the moment a nurse tells you not to try to stand.

A platform on World Sepsis Day

Sunday’s match at Turf Moor is not just Burnley v Sunderland. It falls on World Sepsis Day, a date that now cuts through Bachteler’s calendar.

She had barely heard of sepsis before she was struck down by it.

"I realised it's a leading cause of death. I didn't even know what sepsis was before. I thought it was something you heard on Grey's Anatomy," she said.

"I didn't understand the severity of it and how much it's missed by doctors. The amount of people that have been affected really shocked me. It's a silent killer.

"Hopefully I can use the game as a tool to help others recognise the signs and let them know they are not alone. Over 50% of survivors have [post-sepsis syndrome]."

So when she walks out at Turf Moor, this is more than a professional milestone. It is a statement of survival.

"To be standing on the pitch, doing something that I love, that I've dreamed of doing every single day and knowing that wouldn't have been the case almost a year ago, it's a bit poetic it's on World Sepsis Day."

From ICU to the technical area, from oxygen masks to touchline instructions, Jackie Bachteler’s return is already one of the stories of Burnley’s season.

Now comes the part she has been waiting for: seeing how far this team – and this second chance – can go.