Nov 28th

Hello everyone,

This really is a rollercoaster little journey that Ashling is having. Just when we thought she was on the mend, she had a bit of a set back on Tuesday. She was going so well we were moved to a lesser intensive ward but she started to breathe heavier and seemed to be working very hard. First impressions of an X-ray suggested that her operation hadn't been successful but later that was ruled out. It now looks like part of her lung has collapsed which sounds very bad but hopefully it isn't. It's maybe just fluid in her lung or it's maybe just over worked and has shutdown for a few days. The frustrating thing is that there doesn't seem to be any consise answers and only time will tell. She has improved but is still not back to where she was on Monday.

Thank you to everyone for your comments, they are a breath of fresh air and we love reading all the kind words and prayers of support for Ashling and ourselves. We have a good chat every night about the different comments. We were just saying that it would be great if you left an email address as we have no way of getting back to some of you. It has been fantastic to hear from some people who we haven't talked to in a long time.

PS: What's this "Gerard" about???!!!! I thought my mother was the only person that called me Gerard and that was only when I was in trouble. hehe

Nov 26th - Ashling's Recovery

She's doing great! She still requires some help with her lungs, i.e. a small amount of extra oxygen, but besides that, she's very comfortable. In the last 2 days, I've started breastfeeding her every second feed, and she gets tube fed the other feeds. She's managing really well, though she gets very tired from time to time. We're working it up slowly, taking into account that she still has a compromised lung and she's recovering from major surgery. Considering everything though, she's very comfortable and her wound is healing really well. She's even started smiling!

Tomorrow we have an appointment with the Orthapedic team who are going to make a plan to start helping Ashling to move her limbs more. It's all happening!

Getting home for Christmas is getting more likely every day! Yipee!

Caroline's Mobile Phone - stolen

Lowest of the low - my phone was stolen from the Mother's Lounge at the hospital yesterday morning. So if anyone has been trying to contact me in the past 2 days, sorry! I am going to organise a new phone tomorrow and I'll let you know the details asap.

Unfortunately, I hadn't recorded friends' numbers so it's going to be really hard for a while, trying to get up to date with your numbers again. Talk about bad timing for this to happen!

Update: (Nov 26th)
Got a new phone but kept the same number 021 451424 BUT I don't have many of your numbers. so PLEASE text me your number whenever you get a chance. Thanks!

Tues, 20th November

Thanks for all the lovely comments guys. Ashling will be very pleased with her popularity when she's able to read about the first month of her life!

Well the tubes are all out, Thank God! She is now chest drain, morphine and ventilator free, and her wound from the surgery is healing nicely. She is still on some pain relief and is using an oxygen support system. But they will hopefully be able to wean her off that over the next couple of weeks. Looking at her chest x-rays, it seems like her lung has started to inflate but it will take a wee while for her to be able to breathe properly on her own. She is exhausted after the whole ordeal of the last few days. So we are not allowed to take her out of her cot much but at least we can take her out at least once a day now. Not being able to cuddle her since her surgery last Wednesday was very hard! We were suffering major withdrawal symptoms!!!

Post Operation Friday 16th November

Well no real news yet regarding the success of Ashling's operation as she is still recovering and using a ventilator to help her breathe. Once the doctors can remove her chest drain from the surgery, they will be able to take her off morphine and this will improve her breathing, and make her less dependant on the ventilator. Then we will know whether or not her lung capacity has improved. But looking at her chest x-rays, it looks like the surgeons did an excellent job and we would be very surprised if her breathing doesn't improve.

Yesterday Mam and I were with her and we got a few frights because she was full of mucus and throwing up occassionally. Because she has a tube down her month and in her nose, her cry is a silent one so it was quite easy for her distress to go unnoticed by the nurses. So Nanna decided that a 24 hr vigil would have to be arranged. Thanks to those of you who got roped in last night to sit and watch our munchkin, Auntie Siobhan, Rohan and Lorraine. This made it possible for Ger and I to get a bit of shut-eye. The help was fantastic!

Hopefully, by the end of the weekend, Ashling will be well on her way to breathing on her own or with a little help only. Can't wait to see the Drs take all the blooming tubes out!

Ashlings Operation

Hi Everyone,
Just a quick note to say Ashling's operation went well. It sounds like they had a difficult time finding a vein to give her drugs to knock her out and ruptured an archery before finding one. They were then unable to do the key hole surgery for some reason and had to revert to the classic way of open surgery(really know what I'm talking about here, can you tell!!!). The wound is about 2 1/2 inches long. She is now a bit puffed up on morphine but an x-ray indicates that all is well with her lung which is great news. Caroline will no doubt give a more detailed version soon.
Thanks for all the comments, it's great to receive such love and sincerity from you all. We have wonderful friends.

Ciara's Funeral and an update on Ashling

Car here. Just looked at this website properly for the first time. Obviously, Ger set it up! He's a bit of a legend!

Well it's been a very emotional few days but we have had some closure on Ciara's death through having a funeral service for her. Because the autopsy results came back without any obvious cause of death, which was very hard to deal with, having a small funeral for her on Sunday at our home in Orewa was the best way for us to say goodbye. It was absolutely beautiful. Fr Peter, our fantastic local Priest, said the mass at our house so it was very intimate and personal.

Ashling is doing ok. Unfortunately, she seemed to sense that there was something sad happening on Sunday and she took a couple of steps back while we were gone from the hospital. By the time we got back about 6 hours later, they had put her on increased oxygen supply and had done lots more tests and X-rays because she wasn't a happy camper! We ended up having a big night at the hospital so it was a very emotional day. The doctors now think that she's a bit exhausted from working off a lung and a half, which is pretty much what's she been doing. So the surgery tomorrow should hopefully make a big difference to her. Basically they will be flattening her diaphragm, giving her squashed lung a change to inflate and moving her liver and bowel back down. It will take her a few days to recover and we probably won't see any improvement for a couple of weeks. Hopefully we'll be able to go home then and we can work on her limb problems from home. We really want to have her home for Christmas!!!! I can't imagine how spoilt she's going to be!

So that's the latest. I just want to say sorry for the poor contact over the past fortnight. It's been a complete rollercoaster, mostly plummeting downwards! But hopefully things will get better from here. We have received heaps of texts and messages that we haven't had time to reply to. Please don't feel that we are ignoring you, or that your love and prayers have gone unnoticed but things have been too overwhelming to try to keep up contact with anyone outside of the family, even with all of our families to be honest. But at least with this blog, you'll be able to check what's happening when you want to. Please feel free to add comments here. It will be a lovely thing for us to print and give to Ashling in time, to see how many people loved her before they even met her!

Finally, thank you to everyone who has sent us beautiful flowers, they have really lifted our spirits. However, at this stage because we are staying in temporary accomodation we would prefer that if you really insist on doing something of this nature, you could..........make a wee donation to the ronaldmcdonaldfoundation (as they have been fantastic to us) or to twinlossnewzealand (for the same reasons), or you can drop us in a dinner to the Ronald McDonald House, or just wait a while and get to hold Ashling and give her some cuddles! God knows she deserves them! But continued prayers and positive energy being sent to Ashling, Ger and I is perfectly sufficient, and has definitely helped us get through the hardest period of our lives! Thank you all for that.

We will add some more photos over the next few days. Lots n lots of love, Car and Ger xoxoxo

MRI result Normal

Hello again,
Just a quick update to say our little girl Ashling is doing great.
Yesterday she had an MRI which was the last of a line of intensive testing.
The results of the MRI were NORMAL which is fantastic news and a huge relief for us. It means that her brain bits are all in the right place and as far as they can tell she will have normal intellect. It is not definitive and only time will tell any different. For now we are taking this as very positive news and it is a huge step towards a better life for our sweetheart.

The surgeons visited her yesterday and are talking about operating on her diaphram/lung next Wednesday to relieve the pressure of her liver sitting on top of her right lung.

Caroline is doing great, has a spring back in her step and with the aid of Granma is attending to Ashling's every need. I have returned to work and will hopefully take more time off when she gets to go home, hopefully in the not so distant furture.

Our whereabouts

Since being discharged on Saturday, Caroline and I are now staying at the Ronald McDonald house which is fantastic for us as it is only minutes away from the hospital. Ashling will be there for a couple of weeks until either she is strong enough to go home with oxygen or she has an operation to fix her lung. She is in fantastic hands and is being treated like royalty.

She has had extensive tests over the past 8 days and we have been pretty flat out spending time by her bedside or accompanying her for her tests. The doctors still don't have any conclusive results regarding her condition but no news is good news at this stage.
She seems to be very comfortable and we see postive changes in her every day. Fingers crossed that she will continue to get stronger day by day.

The Birth of our twins, Ashling and Ciara

Below is an email that we sent out but we didn't have everybody's email address so many of you might not have received it.



Dear friends and Family.


We are finally getting around to writing a quick mail to thank you all for your kind thoughts and loving support. The texts and emails of good wishes from everyone have been phenomenal. We are sorry for the lack of contact and information that we have given you but we have found it tough going over the past week and it has been too emotional to put down in words.

As many of you know we came in to Auckland Women’s Hospital last Thursday morning to be induced. On Saturday morning at 2am the doctors decided to do an emergency C-Section because Ashlings’s heart rate kept dipping and they didn’t think she’d last the stress of a natural birth. It was all really scary and Car and I found the C- section quite overwhelming. Little Ashling was born first and was whisked away to do whatever they do with newborns before she was taken to NICU (Newborn Intensive Care Unit).

Next our second twin, our little angel Ciara, (who had passed away at 7 months) was born and she was tiny altogether. Finally they removed the placentas, which were fused together. All in all it took about 10 minutes and another 20 or so to sew up my brave and beautiful wife back together.

I know you are all wondering how our little Ashling is getting on so we will try to explain what we know.

The text that was sent to some of you said that she had a few problems, that was for the want of a better word and the lack of information that we had at the time. We don’t have much more information but her symptoms are that she doesn’t move some of her joints very well. She lacks movement in her hands and fingers, and her arms and legs don’t extend fully. Also her diaphragm didn’t develop properly so her lung is squashed, making it difficult for her to breathe properly, and her liver and bowel are displaced on that side.

She is a strong little thing and is breathing quite well with her good lung although she still requires the aid of oxygen. Although she is in intensive care she is quite a content baby and doesn’t seem to be struggling in any way, which is a great thing.

She has undergone some extensive tests this week and we are meeting with the doctors to discuss the initial results tomorrow or Monday.

We got to spend some time with our little daughter Ciara on Saturday and again briefly on Sunday before she was taken to Wellington for an Autopsy. This was very special and emotional for us both, passing away at week 29 she was remarkably real like but a tiny wee thing. The midwives had dressed her in a lovely outfit and put her in a little basket. We got to hold her, said some prayers with her and it is time we will cherish forever.

Caroline is recovering well from the c-section but is trying to be too strong and has been over doing it the past few days paying the price yesterday by getting sick and exhausted. She has finally got some rest and is now recovering well. She is getting around a lot better today.

The staff here in the hospital, the consultants, doctors, midwifes and nurses are fantastic, most of them can’t do enough for us and are so compassionate and friendly. Many of them have gone well beyond the call of duty, it is has just been great.

That’s about all the information that we have at this time but we will send another mail when we have some more news on Ashling. Thanks again for all your prayers and thoughts.

Lots of love,

Blogg Creation

Hi there,
We have been inundated with good wishes and prayers for our little Ashling and are finding it impossible to get back to everyone. We decided to create this blogg in the hope that we can get back to as many people as possible. We will post an update as often as we feel we have something to update.
Thanks to everyone for your mails, phone calls, texts and flowers that you have sent. We really appreciate them.
Regards
Ger, Caroline and Ashling.