Happy Birthday Mam
We put this quick video clips together to wish you a Very Happy 60th Birthday from the three of us. We are really sorry we are not there to celebrate it with you but we will celebrate again when you come over.
Lots of love
Ger, Caroline and Ashling
Click on the below links to view
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m9ZcYbUVWK8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SjJQ1elOLbA
Hello again
Saturday, December 29, 2007
Monday, December 24, 2007
Happy Christmas Everyone.
Hello there,
Happy Christmas to one and all.
Things are pretty much the same from this end. But I am delighted to say that Ashling is still making progress bit by bit every day. "Slow and steady wins the race" they say, we certainly are hoping so.
Our good friends Lavina and Tom arrived from Ireland on Saturday and it is great to have them around for Christmas. We are slighted restricted in what we can do with them as we try to stay as close to the hospital as possible, so there will be no boozy nights out but we are all older and more mature nowadays anyway!!! (or so they say). We also have my cousin, Mairead and her other half, Keith, arriving for a few days, and to top it all off, we have 2 close friends from Sydney, Sonia nd Luis arriving on the 26th so we have a very social time ahead!! Poor Ashling will be completely forgoten about...NOT!
We are heading to Caroline's sister, Siobhan's, for Christmas day/evening for dinner with some of her family so we are looking forward to that.
I hope you all have a peacful and happy christmas. All the very best for the new year and I hope Santy comes!!
Finally a quick word of thanks to you all. We cannot believe the warmth, love and support we are receiving through this blog, little did we know when we were setting it up. We have heard for friends far and near, some people we have hardly talked to since our college days. Its fantastic and great to be back in contact. I hope we can keep it up.
Merry Christmas Everyone.
Ger, Caroline and Ashling
Happy Christmas to one and all.
Things are pretty much the same from this end. But I am delighted to say that Ashling is still making progress bit by bit every day. "Slow and steady wins the race" they say, we certainly are hoping so.
Our good friends Lavina and Tom arrived from Ireland on Saturday and it is great to have them around for Christmas. We are slighted restricted in what we can do with them as we try to stay as close to the hospital as possible, so there will be no boozy nights out but we are all older and more mature nowadays anyway!!! (or so they say). We also have my cousin, Mairead and her other half, Keith, arriving for a few days, and to top it all off, we have 2 close friends from Sydney, Sonia nd Luis arriving on the 26th so we have a very social time ahead!! Poor Ashling will be completely forgoten about...NOT!
We are heading to Caroline's sister, Siobhan's, for Christmas day/evening for dinner with some of her family so we are looking forward to that.
I hope you all have a peacful and happy christmas. All the very best for the new year and I hope Santy comes!!
Finally a quick word of thanks to you all. We cannot believe the warmth, love and support we are receiving through this blog, little did we know when we were setting it up. We have heard for friends far and near, some people we have hardly talked to since our college days. Its fantastic and great to be back in contact. I hope we can keep it up.
Merry Christmas Everyone.
Ger, Caroline and Ashling
Tuesday, December 18, 2007
What exactly is wrong with Ashling?
Hmmmm - an interesting question indeed and one that MANY doctors have been pondering over for a couple of months now.
Many of you have asked me this question and the answer is - we don't know yet! We don't know what exactly is wrong with Ashling or what caused this.
Both Ashling and Ciara came into this world with stiff limbs. This is not because they were squashed in the womb. On the contrary, I had excess fluid in both sacs so they had plenty of room to move around. However, when an autopsy was done on Ciara, it showed that she also had stiff limbs, but this did not cause her death. The coroner expected to find a heart defect or a brain haemorrhage, but found neither. Unfortunately this means that we will never know why she died but it wasn't due to any obvious "event", as they put it.
As you know, in addition to having stiff limbs, Ashling's diaphragm was elevated. Again, a mystery!
What will happen over the next few months is that, depending on how Ashling develops, they will be able to diagnose her problem properly (hopefully) i.e give it a name! Then we will get some idea of her future prognosis. And we will hopefully find out the cause and look at its implications.
The only thing we know right now is that Ashling is improving everyday and it looks like she'll lead a normal enough life. Only time will tell with Ash but it looks like she has normal intellect and that her problems are mostly physical, which will hopefully be rectified with time. Whatever happened to the girls was not the result of all the drugs and alcohol that I consumed while I was pregnant (Not!). The doctors have reassured me hundreds of times that this was not my fault in any way.
Anyway, hope that this answers some of your questions - for now.
Many of you have asked me this question and the answer is - we don't know yet! We don't know what exactly is wrong with Ashling or what caused this.
Both Ashling and Ciara came into this world with stiff limbs. This is not because they were squashed in the womb. On the contrary, I had excess fluid in both sacs so they had plenty of room to move around. However, when an autopsy was done on Ciara, it showed that she also had stiff limbs, but this did not cause her death. The coroner expected to find a heart defect or a brain haemorrhage, but found neither. Unfortunately this means that we will never know why she died but it wasn't due to any obvious "event", as they put it.
As you know, in addition to having stiff limbs, Ashling's diaphragm was elevated. Again, a mystery!
What will happen over the next few months is that, depending on how Ashling develops, they will be able to diagnose her problem properly (hopefully) i.e give it a name! Then we will get some idea of her future prognosis. And we will hopefully find out the cause and look at its implications.
The only thing we know right now is that Ashling is improving everyday and it looks like she'll lead a normal enough life. Only time will tell with Ash but it looks like she has normal intellect and that her problems are mostly physical, which will hopefully be rectified with time. Whatever happened to the girls was not the result of all the drugs and alcohol that I consumed while I was pregnant (Not!). The doctors have reassured me hundreds of times that this was not my fault in any way.
Anyway, hope that this answers some of your questions - for now.
Christmas in NICU (Neonatal Intensive Care Unit)
Well it looks like we'll be here for Christmas but it could be a lot worse. The unit has been decorated beautifully and there is a lovely Christmasy atmosphere around the place.
It seems like Ashling has turned the corner - she looks bigger and stronger everyday, and her lung capacity seems to be getter better. We are quietly confident that we will get home sometime in January, if this progress continues. Exciting stuff at this stage as we can hardly remember what it's like to have a bit of normality and live in our own home (even though Ronald McDonald House has been great).
Well, hope you all have a lovely Christmas and thanks again for all your kind words and prayers!
We'll keep this blog updated throughout the Christmas period so stay tuned! We're going to try to put a little video on it next! xxx
It seems like Ashling has turned the corner - she looks bigger and stronger everyday, and her lung capacity seems to be getter better. We are quietly confident that we will get home sometime in January, if this progress continues. Exciting stuff at this stage as we can hardly remember what it's like to have a bit of normality and live in our own home (even though Ronald McDonald House has been great).
Well, hope you all have a lovely Christmas and thanks again for all your kind words and prayers!
We'll keep this blog updated throughout the Christmas period so stay tuned! We're going to try to put a little video on it next! xxx
Friday, December 14, 2007
Thank you! Dec 14th
Once again, thanks so much for all your wonderful words, prayers, love and support that you've given the 3 of us. It has helped us more than you'll ever know. Please God we'll be home in Orewa after Christmas and I'll be able to get in touch with many of you to express our gratitude properly. In the meantime, Ashling seems to be doing a little bit better (I'm almost afraid to say it, not to mind write it). So keep up the prayers!
Best way to contact us besides this blog and our email is by texting or calling us on our mobiles:
Caroline's is 021 451424 (and remember that my phone was recently stolen so I don't have many of your numbers. Thanks to those who sent them on)
Ger's is 021 986837
Lots of love Always, Car, Ger and Ashling x
Best way to contact us besides this blog and our email is by texting or calling us on our mobiles:
Caroline's is 021 451424 (and remember that my phone was recently stolen so I don't have many of your numbers. Thanks to those who sent them on)
Ger's is 021 986837
Lots of love Always, Car, Ger and Ashling x
Tuesday, December 11, 2007
Recovery from surgery and her leg casts.
Sorry it's been a while but we haven't had a lot to report. Ashling is very content these days but her breathing doesn't seem to be making much progress. It seems that she progressed too quickly after the surgery and then crashed. It now looks like it may take a while for her lung to inflate and grow into the space that has been provided by the surgery. We also just found out that she has a broken rib from the surgery so that has compromised her further. The good thing is that she is growing nicely, which is a big positive and the doctors are telling us that in time her breathing will improve as she gets stronger.
As you can see from the pictures she is sporting two white casts on her legs. They go up to the top of her thigh . The idea of them is to help flatten and straighten her feet and knees. They are on for six weeks and will be replaced once a week. This is her second week of them and she doesn't seem to mind having them too much. They are quite heavy so she's lucky that she has a sedentry lifestyle!
As you can see from the pictures she is sporting two white casts on her legs. They go up to the top of her thigh . The idea of them is to help flatten and straighten her feet and knees. They are on for six weeks and will be replaced once a week. This is her second week of them and she doesn't seem to mind having them too much. They are quite heavy so she's lucky that she has a sedentry lifestyle!
Monday, December 3, 2007
How to use this site
For those of you who are a bit confused, here's a quick bit of info....
If you want to go back to the beginning to read our first entry (first blog), you need to go to the archive under the photos, click on the arrow beside "2007" . Then you should see the first entry - "Blog Creation" at the bottom of the page and you can follow the sequence of events reading from the bottom to the top, where the most recent entry is.
If you'd like to leave a comment, you can chose to leave it under any one of the blogs. You just need to click on "comments" and then put your name in the username box and then write your comment. After you've entered a comment, it doesn't appear immediately, it comes to us and we have to check it before it's published. It should be up by the next day.
As Ger wrote in one of the blogs, we don't have any return contact details for some of you who have been in touch. If you get a chance please leave your number or an email address with your comment so that we can get back to you in time.
If you have any problems using this site please let us know, as chances are that other people are having the same problems. You could write to Ger at ger_collins@hotmail.com if you don't want to out it on the site.
Cheers, Car
If you want to go back to the beginning to read our first entry (first blog), you need to go to the archive under the photos, click on the arrow beside "2007" . Then you should see the first entry - "Blog Creation" at the bottom of the page and you can follow the sequence of events reading from the bottom to the top, where the most recent entry is.
If you'd like to leave a comment, you can chose to leave it under any one of the blogs. You just need to click on "comments" and then put your name in the username box and then write your comment. After you've entered a comment, it doesn't appear immediately, it comes to us and we have to check it before it's published. It should be up by the next day.
As Ger wrote in one of the blogs, we don't have any return contact details for some of you who have been in touch. If you get a chance please leave your number or an email address with your comment so that we can get back to you in time.
If you have any problems using this site please let us know, as chances are that other people are having the same problems. You could write to Ger at ger_collins@hotmail.com if you don't want to out it on the site.
Cheers, Car
Dec 3rd - No news really
Ash is doing alright but no major change over the weekend. She's still on oxygen support but she is very comfortable. She's getting her foot and leg casts tomorrow as they had to put it off last week cause she wasn't up to it. The casts will stay on for about 6 weeks, but they'll be redone weekly as babies grow so quickly. Thank God or she'd have very smelly feet!
Othewise she's well, getting very alert now and starting to suck her thumb a little bit (ok I admit...I do force it in her mouth a wee bit)
No more for now. Hope you've all done your Christmas shopping. It could be Easter time for all we know!
Othewise she's well, getting very alert now and starting to suck her thumb a little bit (ok I admit...I do force it in her mouth a wee bit)
No more for now. Hope you've all done your Christmas shopping. It could be Easter time for all we know!
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