Lets start at the beginning…

On Wednesday 5th August 2020, my Wife went into labour, but it wasn’t until 01:27am 06/08 that our Daughter was born and I officially became a Dad – the Dad worries came all too soon though.

Our Daughter got stuck during birth; one of her shoulders wouldn’t come out, it’s a condition I now know to be called ‘Shoulder Dystocia’ – her head and one shoulder was already out. The reason this is important is because this stopped our Daughter from breathing until they could free the shoulder and get her out fully. We were told that it took around 3 minutes for them to free her, we were there, but not timing; I mean why would you?
The 3 minutes it took her to be freed meant our Daughter had no oxygen being sent to her brain for the same amount of time. She was born limp & lifeless. They put her in a towel and then onto my Wife’s chest whilst trying to clean her and wake her up. Unfortunately, this had no effect and our Daughter was taken from us around 2 minutes after being born. Neither my Wife or I saw her for around 20-25 minutes after that, then I was asked to go and see her just outside the birth suite door. There was about 10 doctors all stood around my Daughter, who I could now see looked still asleep, not breathing/moving. I noticed that a doctor was breathing for her by using a tube that was now in her mouth. I was told that she hadn’t been breathing for a period of time from birth and she’ll need to go to neonatal. I went back into the room and had to tell and describe to my Wife what I’d just seen; at which point we both started crying.

Around 2 hours passed whilst my Wife was stitched up. During this time, updates were scarce, we didn’t fully know what was going on… if our Daughter was ok, or if she’s even alive. It was hard. Then 3 doctors (that we hadn’t met before) walked in with a leaflet. I feared the worst instantly. Whenever you see a doctor holding a leaflet you always get a sense of dread. They explained that our Daughter had gone through a something called a Hypoxic Ischemic Encephalopathy event (HIE for short). Basically her brain was starved of oxygen for a period of time during birth. They invited me to neonatal to see her because my Wife was still not healthy enough to stand after labour. I saw my hours-old Daughter in an incubator, on a ventilator with cables all over her, very pale, almost blue.
I’ll never forget that sight.

The doctors explained that our Daughter was being cooled. She was placed on a cooling mat to 33.5°c as the cold protects the brain so no further damage can occur. They said they couldn’t treat her there and she was being transferred to another hospital in Liverpool, which is around 20 miles away from the hospital we were in at the time.
My Wife still wasn’t well enough to walk, so they wheeled her in a bed to the neonatal unit so she could meet her Daughter properly for the first time. That was really hard for me personally to see – My Wife crying in a hospital bed at the sight of our newborn Daughter in an incubator. The stuff of nightmares for any Husband or Father come to that.

Whilst still trying to make sense of everything that has happened in the last 4 or 5 hours, I’d had both sides of our families and friends contacting me throughout everything wanting updates on the newest member of our family. The longer they hadn’t heard from me, the more I think they were beginning to think that not all has gone to plan.
I couldn’t face explaining it all to everybody, so I called both of our parents and told them what had happened at around 5am, whilst trying (but failing) to compose myself. That itself was draining enough, it’s never nice hearing adults cry, especially if they’re your parents/in-laws.

After a short period of time with her, a transport team had arrived to transfer our Daughter…without us…to the other hospital. She was brought back to see us in a transport incubator just before she went at around 5am, this point my Wife still couldn’t walk. The hospital said that my Wife would be transferred to the same hospital as our Daughter to continue her recovery, but it wouldn’t be until later that day.

We were both tired, awake for almost 36 hours at this point, whilst trying to process this and my Wife having just gone a traumatic childbirth. I left my Wife for an hour or so so that I could go home and gather some belongings for my Wife as we knew that she’d be staying in hospital for at least the short term.

At 6pm that day, my Wife was transferred to the same hospital in Liverpool, I followed the ambulance. Due to COVID-19 restrictions, I wasn’t allowed on the department where my Wife was, but we were both allowed together in intensive care where our Daughter was.
We went to see our Daughter in ICU for a while, whilst trying to make sense of the whole thing, wondering how the hell we ended up in this situation. It’s then that all sorts of thoughts run through your mind. Why us? Did we deserve this? Will she be ok? …and so on.
As you could probably imagine, it’s not easy.

The nurses and doctors were able to give more specialised care at that hospital, hence why she was sent there. After spending what time we could as a family of 3 by our Daughter’s side, I left to come home…on my own. Without my Wife, or my newborn Daughter. This isn’t how it’s supposed to happen. It was so hard to leave that night, I worried constantly about my Wife. She’s an emotional person at the best of times, and I knew that this would be absolutely tearing her up inside. I called my parents on the half hour or so drive from the hospital in Liverpool back to our house, and cried mostly all of the way.

Everybody who is expecting a baby has the whole process mapped out; go into labour, have the baby, go home.
We did the exact same. Nobody ever expects, or even thinks, that anything like this can happen. It hit us like a truck, totally out of the blue. The pregnancy was low risk the whole time. When people ask ‘How’s everything going?’ That isn’t genuinely what they want to know; it’s actually ‘Tell us how well it’s gone’. Nobody expects to hear that the baby has got brain damage. But that was/is the case for us.

Our Daughter was cooled for 72 hours after birth, at which point they begin to gradually warm her up. She was still lifeless and didn’t look alive, the ventilator breathing for her. After gradually bringing her up to around 37°c, they keep her stable and she’s monitored closely. Over the course of the next few days, she does wake up a little, eyes closed though. We were able to hold her, which was nice but scary as there’s still a lot of cables attached to her at this point. It took 4 days since birth for my Wife to properly hold her baby

She was booked to go to Alder Hey for an EEG (brain activity scan) & an MRI scan to confirm the extent of the damage to her brain. This takes place on the day she’s 1 week old. The scans are done and we’re invited to speak about the results. They confirmed the MRI scan was a bad scan and showed severe brain damage. Long and short of it, she will be effected in later life, but they can’t say how. She will have some form of mental/physical disability, but they don’t know what. Only time will tell.
That was really hard to hear, it changes and effects EVERYTHING. There’s not a part of our life it won’t effect, our homelife, worklife, our house in general, can we still work?, will we be enough to care for her?, will we need special help? – all these questions go through our heads.

Over the course of the next few days, the hospital say she’s stable, and slowly cables and machines start to disappear from her and around her, but they need to make sure that she can breathe herself. If she can’t, everything else is pointless, because she cannot sustain life. We were told that they want/need to take her off the ventilator in order for this to happen. This goes two ways…she breathes, happy days, we get rid of the ventilator and move on to the next thing. Or she doesn’t breathe on her own, and ultimately, she would die.

The doctors told us they were confident in the breathing efforts that she’s made before, and that she stands a good chance of breathing on her own, but they couldn’t guarantee it. The fact is, she can’t stay on a ventilator forever either, so it had to be done. We had to be prepared should she not breathe on her own. We had to plan the chain of events that would happen should she not breathe, including where we would like our Daughter to die. Not your usual conversation that a Dad with 1 week experience is expected to have.

We had meetings with a hospice and did hand/foot painting with them, bathing her. I’m not stupid; I know this was being done so that we had some memories of her if the worst was to happen.
The time came for her to come off the ventilator. My Wife’s & my emotions were all over the place.
The tube was removed, and nothing happened. No beeps, no alarms, no warnings. She was breathing on her own, as if it was no trouble at all. They still needed to monitor her for a while as some babies can get tired of breathing and just stop, then we’d be in the same situation, but she didn’t. She just carried on breathing with no problems. Little trooper.

More cables went, more machines went. Even the incubator went. She was then just in a cot, with a few monitoring cables on her. My Wife was discharged from that hospital after a week, but we stayed in family accommodation for 3 nights to be close to our Daughter, even though we didn’t really rest. We finally decided to come home; as you can imagine, my Wife found it really hard leaving our Daughter there. The last time she was at home, she was still pregnant. You’re supposed to bring your baby home after giving birth, not leave them 20 miles away in a hospital.

During the course of all this, our Daughter had properly started to wake up now, as the sedation she was under had starting to wear off. Her eyes were now open, with her arms & legs moving also. She was on a lot of sedation as she had some seizures which is common with babies who have had a HIE event. HIE stands for Hypoxic Ischemic Encephalopathy, and we had never heard of it before, but it happens in around 4 or 5 babies in every 1000 in the UK. We struggle to even pronounce it properly, so it will be referred to as HIE in future.

The nurses told us about a charity called Peeps who provide support to parents & families of those affected by HIE. Their website had a lot of useful info for us, & also stories of other other people who’ve been in our situation; it was nice to know it’s not all doom & gloom. Over the first six months of our Daughter’s life, Peeps have been checking in occasionally, which has been really nice. Whilst still at Liverpool Women’s hospital, we were given a Parent Pack from Peeps. It was full of things to help us, like a water bottle, pen and notepad and things for our Daughter, such as a vest with “Little Warrior” printed across the front and specially designed milestones cards. Along with this, we also got a surprise delivery from them at Christmas. It wasn’t expected but was very much appreciated.
When life is back to normal after COVID and things have settled down with our Daughter, I hope to be able to do some kind of fundraising for them. They are a special charity, and they helped us when we needed it, and even when we didn’t know we needed it. If anyone is familiar with them, I’m sure you’ll know what I mean. Thank you Peeps.

At around 3 weeks old, our daughter was sent for a video fluoroscopy at Alder Hey to confirm if she had a safe swallow. She was found to be able to swallow thicker fluids fine, but thinner fluids veered towards her lungs when swallowing. After the assessment, she was transported back to Warrington hospital, where this had all began. She remained there for around 3 weeks whilst preparations were put in place for her to finally come home. My Wife & I were both shown how to draw up and administer the medications that she needs, and any referrals to healthcare professionals that she would need were completed.

Finally, after 5 weeks, and 3 different hospitals, we brought our Daughter home.
She has a long road ahead of her, all 3 of us do. My Wife & Iwill do whatever we can for her. She’s our Daughter, we love her. She may not be able to live a “normal” life like we assumed before she was born; but it’ll be her normal. She’s a fighter.
All of our family and friends have been really supportive and I know they will continue to be. It’s not going to easy, and some things wont go our way; but our Daughter is progressing and doing new things everyday, slowly; but progressing none the less.

The past 6 months have been like nothing I’ve ever experienced in my life before. One thing it’s shown me though, is how much my Wife and I love each other. We’ve been together for over 15 years this year, and I can see why. We’re each other’s rock. Together, we’ll be ok.