When I began to feel horrific pain, I rushed to hospital. But it was my loved ones who ended up fighting for their lives. By Denise Wilson, 40
Stifling a yawn, I headed downstairs to load up the washing machine.
I was a mum of six. While my eldest three from my first relationship were all grown up, I had three with my hubby Alan who were all under five, so I was rushed off my feet.
‘You've lost weight, love,’ Alan said now, looking at me anxiously.
‘Running around after these lot, I’m not surprised,’ I replied, laughing.
But I could feel a dull ache in my tummy and, as I bent down to pick up a toy, the pain got sharper.
Within a couple of hours, it was so bad I rang 111. They told me to get to A&E.
The ambulance drivers were on strike, so I got in a taxi while Alan stayed to look after the kids.
By the time I reached hospital, I was in agony. A triage nurse handed me two codeine tablets and told me to wait.
But just then my legs buckled, and I slumped to the floor on all fours.
‘Can we get some help for this lady?’ a voice cried.
‘She’s got to wait her turn!’ said another.
Suddenly I felt something drop inside my pelvis.
In horror, I watched as a red liquid gushed out of me, all over the floor.
‘I think this lady is having a really late miscarriage,’ a nurse said, rushing to me.
‘But I’m not pregnant,’ I croaked.
I was helped to a side room and on to a bed.
A nurse examined me and said: ‘You’re definitely pregnant, you’re crowning.’
But I hadn’t missed a period or had any cravings.
I’d been through this six times before, surely I’d have known if I was expecting?
Moments later, I passed out.
When I woke, a nurse told me: ‘You’ve given birth.’
Shaking violently with shock, I tried to take it in as she said my baby was severely premature and in the neonatal unit.
‘We don’t know if it was a boy or a girl yet,’ she said.
I was so dazed I couldn’t speak, so the nurse phoned Alan.
‘We’ve got Denise here,’ she told him. ‘She’s fine, but we have a little something else…’
All I I could do was lie there and imagine Alan’s reaction as she explained that the ‘little something else’ was a surprise baby.
'It's on battle after another'
A little later, the nurse confirmed I’d had a boy, and I was wheeled to the neonatal ward.
‘Hello, I’m your mummy,’ I said tearfully, as I looked at the tiny red bundle in the incubator.
Swamped by a small nappy and weighing just over a pound, he would have fitted in the palm of my hand.
‘There’s a chance he might not make it,’ the doctor warned.
They thought he was born at 23 weeks, and he’d been given steroids to help his lungs develop.
I named him Noah.
At eight hours’ old, he was transferred to Liverpool Women’s Hospital, 25 miles from our home in Skelmersdale, Lancashire.
Two days later, Alan found someone to look after the kids and came to visit.
‘I still can’t believe it,’ he said, his voice cracking with emotion as he gazed at our son.
Noah developed sepsis, and we were told again that he might not survive.
‘You’re my little warrior,’ I told him, when he turned a corner.
But just after it was confirmed he was blind in his right eye, Noah was struck down by meningitis.
‘It’s one battle after another,’ I told Alan, who was as terrified as me.
Yet Noah clung on, and when he was five months’ old, we were finally allowed to bring him home.
Our boy remained on oxygen, and doctors taught me and Alan how to use the equipment.
Just two weeks later, I was giving Noah a 2am feed when I heard an anguished cry from the living room.
I knew Alan was on the couch, trying to get some sleep before he set off for work at 6am.
Hurriedly I settled Noah and rushed downstairs to find Alan writhing on the floor, sweating and gasping for breath.
Frantic, I dialled 999, trying to comfort him until paramedics arrived five minutes later.
They rushed Alan to A&E, while I stayed at home with Noah and the kids.
Please let him be OK, I thought.
Eventually, a doctor called and said: ‘Your husband’s suffered a heart attack. We’ve had to fit a stent, but he’s OK.’
I let out a gasp of relief.
Alan, 51, was a smoker. But doctors believed the stress of Noah’s shock birth, and the fear of losing him, had contributed to the heart attack too.
‘You gave me quite a scare,’ I told Alan when I was able to visit.
‘Lifestyle changes for me, I think,’ he said, knowing he’d been lucky.
Alan’s home now, and I’m caring for both him and eight-month-old Noah.
Our son will need to be on oxygen until he’s 18 months. But just watching him sit with his Daddy, smiling and giggling away, is priceless.
I could’ve lost them both. Instead I feel like the luckiest wife and mum in the world.
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