Happy New Year

Sorry its been a while, we’ve been a bit busy…..


Holly is now 6 weeks and 6 days old 
(31 + 2 weeks if she was still in my tummy!)

On the 16^th December Holly was moved to the Neonatal Unit at University Hospital in Coventry, it was a very scary journey knowing that she was so fragile and tiny and not having the comfort of being inside the hospital walls with access to everything and anything the doctors and nurses could need in an emergency. Non the less, we had to be moved as Holly was considered stable enough to be taken back to “her trust” of hospitals (basically, due to the fact we live in Warwick, we should have been looked after by a hospital in Coventry or Warwickshire, but there were no beds available at the time so we were taken to Birmingham).

The transport team arrived in the early afternoon and we had to leave the room whilst she was being transferred from her little home inside Heartlands incubator, into the transport incubator. She was strapped down inside there as the journey would be a bit bumpy, and then covered in about 5 blankets to make sure she stayed warm. Matt and I had one last look at her before she was taken off into the ambulance to be driven to Coventry. Neither of us were allowed to go into the ambulance as there had to be a doctor, a nurse and 2 ambulance drivers in there with her incase of an emergency on the way, which I wasn’t going to argue with as I wouldn’t of been able to help had anything have happened along the way, but it was still difficult to watch her go knowing she was in an ambulance, away from our safe environment at the hospital, on the road with every man and his dog driving like god knows what and just hoping that she gets there ok.

It took us nearly an hour to get from heartlands to Coventry, due to traffic, and when we arrived Holly had been allocated her little spot, one space down from the window, and all the doctors and nurses were fussing over her and getting her hooked up to all her monitors and breathing support and weighing her and taking her temperature etc….. it was quite scary to see all these different people surrounding her that you hadn’t met before, how could you be sure that they would treat Holly well or that they would keep her as safe as heartlands? At that point in time Holly was having a problem with her heart, her rate kept dropping to half its normal beat and then picking back up again… a few minutes later it would do the same…. This hadn’t happened at heartlands so something must have happened on the journey, or since she had arrived at Coventry hospital, these new people must have done something to hurt her! They took some ECG readings from her (in-between me shouting and cursing at them; bursting into tears because they had done this to her) and they noticed that she had an ectopic heart beat, this had been seen at my last ultrasound as well but we had forgotten about it because of all the stress of Hollys arrival and Heartlands hadn’t picked it up from my maternity notes and didn’t monitor Hollys heart rate as in-depth as Coventry does. So all my worry was over something that Coventry had only identified not caused, which was a good thing (ignorance is most certainly not bliss in this situation – even though it has given Matt and I one more thing to worry about) because it meant that they were on the ball and looking at the full picture of Hollys health (heartlands were fantastic too, but just had not picked this up for some reason) and can make fully informed decisions about her medical treatment.

The rest of the night was difficult as there were new nurses to meet and build relationships with, new doctors to understand and new mini neighbours for Holly to make friends with (on that note, little baby Jack responded well to his steroids and was doing just fine the last time I saw him – I am no longer able to be updated on his progress as it is confidential to his family and I am not in touch with Jacks mum or dad now that we have left the hospital, although Holly did manage to send Jack a Christmas card!). We stayed late that night and tried to settle into our new home for the coming months.

Since then a lot has happened…..

Holly stayed on her CPAP for only a few days before they tried her onto “high flow” oxygen, this is where she just has a tube across her face with 2 little prongs sitting her nose pushing air into her lungs to make sure they never fully deflate to make it easier for her to breathe. She started off having 5 litres of oxygen and then every day they turned it down by 1 litre until she was at 2 litres. The doctor then made the decision that she was ready to go onto “low flow” oxygen, this doesn’t give any pressure into her lungs, it is the same type of machine as “high flow” (the little nose prongs) but just blows extra oxygen for Holly to breathe when she takes her own breaths, she lasted on this for about 1 hour…… she didn’t need it, she was breathing all by her self no oxygen needed, no pressure needed, she was just like every other baby, breathing in and out with no mechanical help what so ever! This enormous step forward made it feel like I had suddenly remembered how to breathe again as well, it was like a weight had lifted from our hearts, it gave me and Matt confidence for the first time that our little baby girl will one day come home with us…. We can see the light at the end of the tunnel…finally.

Holly is doing so well and just keeps moving forwards, she is having more and more milk now (it is fortified – this means they add a special powder to it which gives her more protein and calories to help her gain weight) and gaining ounces every week – she now weighs 1.03kg (2lb 4oz) and her cheeks are getting chubbier by the minute! She sometimes needs a little bit of oxygen in her incubator (but no machine attached to her – it just gets pumped into the actual incubator) but this is only between 1-2% and for around 20hours of the day she is just breathing the same air as you and me.

I will try and keep you updated a bit more regularly now that the move/Christmas/new year is over, but I can’t promise anything!

I might not get the pictures & videos up tonight but I will put them on here as soon as possible as I am dying to show you how much she’s grown and how beautiful she is looking…. Matt and I are arguing over who she looks like more, I think she is looking more like me and of course Matt thinks she looks like him, let me know what you think when ive put the photos of her up.

Thank you again to everyone who is following the blog and thinking of Holly, it is amazing the support we have had from total strangers, old work colleagues, parents of friends, friends of parents, even shop staff! and of course all of our family and friends….. Thank you. From the bottom of our hearts x