Our beautiful daughter Jessica was born in September 2011 with a severe heart defect called hypoplastic left heart syndrome. This was diagnosed at her 20 week scan and we were initially told that she was unlikely to be suitable for surgery. However, a pioneering in-utero operation at 28 weeks to enlarge a hole in her atrial septum was carried out and she was able to make it to term and get through her first open-heart surgery at just eight hours old. Jessica underwent five more surgeries during her life. Her final surgery - the Fontan procedure - took place in December 2017. She initially made a good recovery but sadly passed away suddenly on 14th April 2018 at the age of 6. This is the story of a little girl whose half a heart overflowed with love. She was, and will forever be, our little miracle and brought joy to all who knew her.

Monday 22 July 2013

Iggle-Piggle, performing, painting, Peppa Pig World and postboxes


With all this lovely sunshiney weather, we have been out and about quite a bit as a family and Jessica has been coping very well with the heat on the whole. July has certainly been quite a fun month for her so far. We started off with a trip to see ‘In The Night Garden Live’ at the beginning of July along with Jessica’s cousin Scarlett-Rose who is twelve days older than Jessica and they both enjoyed the show very much. We had tickets to meet Iggle-Piggle and Upsy-Daisy after the show which Jessica absolutely loved – she gave a big squeal of excitement and went running up to them and gave them lots of cuddles and kisses.


The following weekend saw all of us taking part in a fundraising concert called ‘Here Comes Summer’ to raise money for our church audio-visual equipment upgrade project. Jessica made her second stage appearance in the final number ‘The Sun Has Got His Hat On’ which she knows from her baby signing classes and so she was also doing some of the signs while we were all singing. She had her last signing class in the baby group last Friday and will be moving up to the toddler class over the summer.


She painted her first picture at a Stay and Play session at our local children’s centre last week which Mummy has very proudly put on the fridge. It is the first time she has shown an interest in the paint table even though it has been out at nearly ever session she has been to.



We had a trip to Paulton’s Park at the weekend thanks to Families of Ocean Ward who organised a trip for heart families from the ward and Jessica loved the rides at Peppa Pig World. Now she is more confident with her walking, she has also become more confident at climbing on various things in playgrounds and then going down the slides so she had a lovely time in the toddler playground as well. She also thoroughly enjoyed ‘Muddy Puddles’ – a water area for small children and had a fabulous time splashing about with all the water jets.



We have been visiting some more postboxes around the country and are now up to 56 Olympic ones (8 left to go!) and 17 Paralympic ones. Jessica has got quite used to being sat on top of them and holding up a picture to show whose postbox we are visiting!


Jessica had another eye check-up today at Windsor and there is a very slight improvement in her vision which means a new pair of glasses. The team there think that by the time she is eight or nine, she will no longer need to wear glasses to correct her squint. This is the first time they have confirmed that Jessica may not need to wear glasses permanently so is encouraging news.

 

We would also like to say a big thank you to 1st Uxbridge Boys Brigade who held a 'London Literary Tour' sponsor day in March and raised £450 for Little Hearts Matter which they presented to us at their parade day in July - well done to the Boys' Brigade!