2014 has been a good year on the whole for Jessica. We had one hospital admission, which was her
planned admission for her cardiac catheter.
The results indicated that the pressures in her lung arteries are not
too high although the arteries themselves are quite small and the team felt
that they needed time to grow before her next surgery is planned. At present, we anticipate that this surgery
may take place towards the end of 2015 but it will depend on how Jessica is
coping with her current circulation and the plan is to have another cardiac
catheter investigation before planning this surgery. Jessica has her next check-up at the end of
January. Her check-ups this year have
generally been encouraging – her cardiac condition is currently stable and her
community nurse checks have shown that her sats have generally stayed in the
low 80s and that Jessica is gaining weight well. We have a lot to be thankful for this year –
she has done so very well and we pray that she will continue to do well through
2015 too.
We have had a lovely year as a family – enjoying our firstholiday abroad and lots of days out over the summer. It has been wonderful to watch the sibling
bond grow and develop between Jessica and Sophie – naturally, there are moments
when there is conflict but on the whole they are adorable together and it is
lovely to see how Jessica reaches for her sister’s hand to try and lead her
places now that Sophie is able to walk alongside her and how loving they often
are together. We feel very blessed with
our two beautiful daughters.
We were very proud of Jessica being so good about hanging
her dummies on the tree for the baby reindeer to take away when our Christmas
tree went up. Whilst it did take a long
time for her to settle down to sleep that first night, she didn’t cry for them
and she has coped very well without them since (and was very happy with the
little present the baby reindeer left behind as a thank you!)
Jessica and Mummy had fun on Christmas Eve making a
gingerbread house and baking biscuits for Father Christmas as well as going
outside to see his sleigh fly overhead. Michael’s
article reflecting on being a heart dad was featured in the winter issue of
Heartline magazine which arrived in the post on Christmas Eve.
We enjoyed spending Christmas at home this year with Grandma
and Grandad over to share the day with us.
The girls loved opening all their presents and have been having a lot of
fun playing with their new toys. We
spent a couple of days after Christmas with Louise’s family and Jessica and
Sophie had a lovely time seeing Nanny and their aunties, uncles and cousins
from that side of the family.
We enjoyed ‘going on a bear hunt’ today to look for the
Paddington bear sculptures that have been placed around London. We had originally intended to try and look
for them all but hadn’t managed to get into London to see them and as today was
the last day, we decided that we should at least find some. We managed to find 13 in total and Jessica
loved seeing all the bears and having her photo taken with them.
The beginning of next month will see Jessica starting
preschool – a big milestone and hopefully one that she will cope well with. Our little girl is growing up so fast!
Thank you as always to all our lovely friends, family and
everyone else who has supported us on our journey as a heart family. Wishing you all peace and blessings for 2015.
