12Feb08 - Special Post

Last week we had some excellent news, Lucy’s best friend Laila has a new baby sister.She has been named Kyla which comes from her brother and sister’s names. As well as being a lovely name the significance to Hayley and Paul is immense. Their son Kai died when he was very small and they have honoured his memory in the best way possible. Laila has had similar challenges to Lucy and has brought significant changes to their lives in the last three years. Kai and Laila will now always be a inextricably linked to their new little sister. I think Kyla symbolises in a really loving way that after all the hardship Hayley and Paul have had to suffer they still cherish what they have and their strong will to carry on regardless has resulted in something wonderful. I am so pleased for them and for Laila. Having a little sister will be so good for her.It was certainly not all plain sailing though. Due to Hayley’s history she was constantly monitored throughout her pregnancy. Towards the end she was in and out of hospital and had a couple of early scares. Kyla was born by caesarean section at 35 weeks just a touch over 6 pounds. At first everything went well and we even got an picture message the same day. She was moved to the neonatal unit for monitoring because she was a little premature and still quite weak. It was wonderful news because we had all being worrying if everything would go okay. The next day we received a message to say that Kyla was being put on a ventilator and being moved to a different hospital in Manchester. It was terrible news and it was difficult not to think that everything was going wrong. Hayley was stuck in our hospital and could not go with her baby so had to lie there wondering what was going to happen. It must have been absolute torture. Thankfully by the following day Kyla no longer needed the ventilator and it wasn’t long before she was back in the local neonatal unit.
We finally got to visit Kyla a week ago and it filled me with mixed emotions. It was the first time I had been back to the neonatal unit since we walked out of there on our way home with Lucy. Just walking into the building brought everything back. Walking down the corridor in the neonatal unit felt so horribly familiar I just wanted to turn and walk out but I am glad I didn’t. Little Kyla looked so tiny and so gorgeous. Hayley let me put my hands into the incubator and hold her tiny hands. The first thing that came into my head was that everything was working properly. She was moving normally, her hands were opening and closing and she was twiddling her toes. It almost felt unatural and I know that for Hayley and Paul, the differences between Laila and Kyla have exposed how different it is to have a normal baby. One of the first things Paul commented to us was that Kyla was already looking at him and he knew that she could see him. It sounds like such an obvious thing but I understand exactly what he meant. We are conditioned to interpret minute responses from Lucy and Laila that would not be recognised by anybody that did not know them, so to suddenly see how a normal baby responds without effort, makes you realise how different you experience has been. Looking at Kyla I felt this too but for the first time since Lucy was born I didn’t feel resentful seeing a perfect little baby. No one deserved this more than Hayley and Paul and I am really happy that it has all worked out for them. Their story just proves that it doesn’t matter how cruel life can be, if you stay strong, stick together and don’t lose hope in the future, wonderful things can still happen.