A HOLE lot of love
Charlotte Lake, 23, from Annan, didn’t realise that her newborn daughter’s snore was a sign of things worse to come...
Trying to get a quick snooze, we couldn’t help but giggle. ‘Oh my God, she is a proper little snorer,’ both me and my fiancé Nathan, 25, laughed, watching our newborn daughter Avarose in June last year.
In fact, unlike our eldest Finlay, now three, Ava certainly loved her sleep.
It didn’t matter where she was, she’d fall asleep at the drop of a hat.
She was a whole new version of sleepy – any parent’s dream.
Especially after we’d experienced a not very glamorous pregnancy.
I had bad morning sickness, so it wasn’t a smooth ride.
Fin was excited about being a big brother, always wanting to bounce on the pregnancy ball with me.
Nathan and I even bought him a doll to practise with.
However, flinging it around by the legs, it wasn’t the reaction that we expected!
Only then, on 25 June 2023 at 6.21pm, weighing 7lbs 12oz, our baby girl arrived at Dumfries and Galloway Royal Infirmary in three pushes.
To put it bluntly, Ava shot out like a waterslide.
So, when we realised that Ava slept like a dream baby, snoring her head off, it felt like the calm after the storm.
Only, as days turned into a week, a niggling doubt started to creep in.
‘I’m not sure she is supposed to be this tired,’ I admitted to Nathan, as Ava started to dose off mid-feed. ‘Something’s not quite right.’
As the week went on, the snoring sounded more like Ava had a bad cold instead.
However, with the midwife ready to discharge us from home visits on 4 July last year, I had to say how we felt.
‘Ava’s breathing doesn’t sound right. She sounds snotty,’ I confessed.
Checking Ava’s heart rate, counting her breaths per minute, the midwife’s face quickly dropped.
‘I’m going to call the hospital,’ she panicked.
Finding out more, Ava’s heart was going at 220bpm, her breath count double what it should have been, too.
‘They want to send an ambulance,’ the midwife said.
We will get there and it will be nothing, I thought.
‘Where are you going, Mummy?’ Fin cried, getting a little upset as both Nathan and I were packing a bag.
However, thankfully, Nathan still had a week of paternity leave left, so he was able to stay at home with him.
‘She will be fine,’ Nathan said, kissing me goodbye, as the ambulance arrived with blue lights outside.
It’s just a fluke, I thought. Flooring it on the M3 to Dumfries Royal Infirmary, I sat on the bed in the back of the ambulance with Ava in my arms, needing to hold an oxygen mask over her face. There will be nothing wrong. Only, that feeling changed when we reached the hospital.
Needing multiple tests, medics believed that Ava had an infection at first, white shadows on her lungs.
Pneumonia was a word that was flying around the room.
Only then, another phrase entered the conversation the next day on 5 July last year.
‘I think she could have a heart murmur,’ the medic admitted. ‘She needs to see a heart specialist.’
‘Right, OK. How do we do that?’ I replied.
‘We’re going to need to transfer you to Glasgow Royal
Infirmary,’ the doctor said.
With Nathan needing to stay at home with Fin, I had to go with Ava on my own.
‘It’s not going to be anything worrying. They are just running more tests,’ I explained to Nathan.
As even though they had mentioned a heart murmur, I didn’t want to jump to any conclusions about anything.
‘There’s good news and bad news,’ the specialist confirmed the following day.
Holding my breath, I wasn’t sure what to expect.
‘Ava hasn’t got a murmur,’ he revealed. ‘But she does have a large hole in her heart that will require surgery.’
‘Oh, OK,’ I whispered. The news not sinking in.
It was something that the pregnancy scans hadn’t shown.
Our girl was tiny, just 12 days old.
And it was then, after finding out Ava’s diagnosis, that we travelled back to Dumfries, with Nathan meeting us there.
Fin stayed with our parents during that time.
‘What the heck are we going to do next?’ Nathan admitted.
In all honesty, I didn’t know how to answer.
And before Ava was able to have surgery, we were told that she would need to gain weight.
So, coming home, it was all systems go.
With Nathan needing to go back to work, he’d have12hour shifts, combined with nights, which made things really difficult.
Especially as I had to juggle pumping every two hours with caring for Fin, too.
Unable to leave the house, Fin was really curious.
‘Be careful,’ I instructed. ‘I make sister better,’ he smiled, trying to help.
Pumping six times a day, I had to get up every three hours in the night.
Only, no matter how much milk I expressed, it wasn’t enough, as Ava wasn’t gaining any more weight.
At times I’d struggle to even get a smile out of her.
Needing to be placed on a feeding tube, and then a pump for 24-hours a day, I thought we were running out of time.
However, thankfully, we then got a date for surgery – 6 October last year.
And then, arriving at Glasgow Royal Infirmary early that morning, leaving Fin at home, Nathan and I got the finer details.
‘If she doesn’t have this she will die before she goes to school and she could die on the table, too,’ the surgeon said.
‘What if she doesn’t make it?’ I said to
Nathan. Only, with Ava needing to be taken into surgery at 9.30am, we then had to say goodbye to her.
Screaming and fighting the docs off before her body went limp, I broke down crying.
It might be the last time I see her alive... And for the hours that followed, knowing surgery could take all day, that was all I could think about.
Trying to distract ourselves, Nathan and I went shopping in the centre of Glasgow.
Only, checking his phone every five minutes, Nathan admitted that he felt sick – I did, too.
It was then, at roughly 2pm, that we found out we had managed to get accommodation at the Ronald Mcdonald House near the hospital – which was a relief.
Checking in and having a little nap, we then got a call from the hospital.
‘Surgery has gone well. You’ll be able to see her this evening,’ the doctor revealed.
It was the best news we could have heard – only, I wanted to see Ava and know more.
‘She’s done well, but do you know the size of the hole?’ the surgeon asked. ‘It was 1.5cm x 1cm – that’s really big.’
Not only was the hole much bigger than expected but Ava also had blood in her lungs – which explained the white shadows and the snoring, too.
She wasn’t just a sleepy baby, she was gurgling blood.
Thank God I listened to my gut, I thought.
Seeing Ava for the first time at roughly 6.30pm, it wasn’t a nice sight to see.
With a huge scar on her chest, she was sedated, on a ventilator, fluids, six different medications, IV lines and all these other monitors.
She didn’t look like our daughter at all.
And even though Ava’s surgery went well, sealing the hole in her heart shut, we weren’t out of the woods yet.
However, within just a few days in ICU, Ava was doing incredibly – every machine removed by 13 October.
Back and forth from Dumfries, Nathan tried his best to juggle both seeing Ava and Fin – it was tough.
Only, on 14 October, just eight days after surgery, we were able to bring our baby girl home, ready for bedtime.
For so long, we didn’t have a normal family dynamic.
And even though Fin knew Ava was getting her heart fixed, he didn’t really understand.
If anything, he was more upset that he hadn’t seen Nathan and I for extended periods of time.
‘Fix her!’ Fin would repeat, wanting to play doctors with Ava – however, he was very gentle and caring, too.
By 25 October, Ava didn’t need her feeding tube anymore as I started breast feeding again.
And after weekly check-ups, Ava, now eight months, will get seen again when she turns one, checked yearly after that, too.
She will need monitoring for the rest of her life, to ensure that the hole doesn’t reopen.
We decided to start a Gofundme raising money for Ronald Mcdonald and the Glasgow Children’s Trust to show how grateful we truly are.
We’ve had to shut it now as we’ve raised £2,290 in total.
Even though Ava may still be very small, she is sassy and doesn’t like anyone but her mum and dad.
Playing with Fin, he will build LEGO blocks with her, making her giggle.
Plus, Ava sleeps well now. I never thought that a snore could be a sign of something much worse – I’m glad I listened to my instincts.
Even though Ava had a difficult start, I’m so proud of how far she has come.
Her fight came from the heart – something that she reminds us all daily.
It was the best news we could have heard