Clots, cuddles and cartoon characters

Our rollercoaster ride on PICU continued yesterday evening when Jessica had a chest X-ray and another echo. The chest X-ray showed that her lungs were looking a little wet and the echo showed that the right lung was more solid than the left. The cardiology team thought that this might be due to a haematoma (blood clot) in the right lung and considered whether Jessica needed to go back to theatre to have her chest re-opened and the blood clot removed. However, as she was doing well off the ventilator and things were stable, Mr Haw, our surgeon, felt that it would be better to opt for conservative management and observe rather than putting Jessica through another operation which may not be necessary.

The plan was then for Jessica to have a CT chest scan in the morning if things remained stable overnight and take things from there. However, as Jessica had a good night and was looking better again in the morning, the team decided that the CT scan would not change the plan of conservative management. Jessica’s breathing rate was also less rapid than it had been the previous day and we are hoping that the clot will just break down and be reabsorbed into the body without the need to intervene.

After the rollercoaster of the past few days, it was wonderful to see Jessica doing so well and in the early afternoon, we were finally able to give our beautiful daughter a cuddle after more than a week of not being able to hold her. Such an amazing moment – we have really missed our cuddles during the last week.

Peppa Pig visited PICU in the afternoon and posed for a photo with the three of us. We also had a lovely visit from Nanny and Auntie Twinny who came bearing Christmas cards and presents from the family.

The number of tubes going in and out of Jessica is gradually decreasing as her arterial line and urinary catheter were both removed today. She has been more like her usual self, looking up at everyone who comes to see her and taking in what is going on, and is also sleeping more normally. We are hoping that things continue to improve over the next couple of days and perhaps we may be back up on Ocean Ward by Christmas Day.