Jamie-Lynn Sigler has just experienced a “life earthquake.”
The 43-year-old “Sopranos” actress posted about the term in her Instagram story on Monday after announcing that her 10-year-old son Beau was finally released from the hospital following a serious health scare.
Sigler shared author and keynote speaker Laura Dawn’s post that included the definition of “lifequake.”
“A significant, sudden and unexpected change in the course of your life that may feel devastating at first but has the positive side effect of catalyzing personal growth, transformation and rebirth,” it said.
Over the weekend, Sigler announced on Instagram that her son, who had been diagnosed with acute disseminated encephalomyelitis (ADEM) and had experienced a “nightmare” in the intensive care unit, had left the hospital after a 33-day stay.
She shared a video of Beau walking down a hospital hallway while people lined up on both sides cheering him on.
“My brave boy, you are a walking miracle,” Sigler wrote of Beau, whom she has with husband Cutter Dykstra.
“The rest of this story is one that Beau can tell himself if he chooses to one day,” she noted, before thanking the “incredible” staff at Dells Children’s Hospital in Austin, Texas, for their “patience, dedication and expertise.”
Sigler announced earlier this month that Beau has ADEM – a very rare neurological immune reaction that children can sometimes get after being infected with a simple virus.
“To say this has been hard would be an understatement and I have never felt so broken,” she wrote on Instagram on August 6.
In her podcast with Christina Applegate, Sigler said her eldest son had a fever of 104 degrees and was screaming that his head hurt when he was taken to the hospital. He was taken to the emergency room three times in the following days, but was sent home after tests.
Beau was eventually taken to the intensive care unit, where he lost the ability to speak and eventually the ability to move his legs, Sigler said.
“It was and is the darkest, hardest, shittiest thing I have ever experienced,” the “Big Sky” actress explained in her podcast.
Sigler has struggled with her own health issues since being diagnosed with multiple sclerosis (MS) at age 20.
She waited until 2016 to publicly announce her diagnosis.
“When you get a diagnosis, there can often be anxiety, depression, sadness and grief,” Sigler told PEOPLE last year. “I’ve really come to that point of understanding, processing those feelings and coming to that point of acceptance.”
In her podcast “MeSsy,” Sigler speaks openly about her battle with MS with Applegate, who is also battling the disease.
