Woman unable to sleep learns she won big Powerball prize in Michigan. ‘Hasn’t sunk in’

A 65-year-old woman was unable to sleep the night after a recent Powerball drawing, so she turned to her phone to pass the time.

“I play Powerball every once in a while, and usually check the results the morning after the drawing,” Deborah Bates, of Rochester, told the Michigan Lottery.

But this time, the results came to Bates during her sleepless night.

“I was playing on my phone, when an email from the Lottery came through that said: ‘Your winnings have arrived,’” she recalled to lottery officials.

“When I logged in to my Lottery account and saw my account balance was $500,000, I couldn’t believe it,” Bates continued. “I woke my husband up and had him look everything over to make sure it was real. It still hasn’t sunk in that I won!”

The ticket Bates bought online had matched four white balls and the Powerball during the Dec. 14 drawing, according to a Jan. 19 news release. This technically qualified her for a $50,000 prize.

But because she paid $1 to add the Power Play option to her ticket, officials said, her winnings were multiplied by 10 for a total of $500,000.

Bates plans to save her prize money, officials said.

After taxes, she took home $358,750.

Her winning ticket was bought online at MichiganLottery.com.

This story was originally published January 19, 2023 at 10:34 AM with the headline "Woman unable to sleep learns she won big Powerball prize in Michigan. ‘Hasn’t sunk in’."