Our Brave Twin Boys

After the birth of our twin boys Axel and Acer on the 30th of November 2021, our world was turned completely upside down as new parents, when in the early hours of the morning on the 5th of December, (suspecting jaundice), & on the advice of the on call midwife, we took our little boys to Darlington hospital A&E.

Something clearly just wasn’t quite right, and after being seen by numerous consultants, doctors, midwives and nurses, the true reality of the situation began to dawn upon us - our little boys had rapidly become very much more poorly than we had originally thought.

Hours which seemed like an eternity passed, whilst tests were conducted on the boys to try and arrive at some sort of diagnosis, and​ whilst a definitive diagnosis was still not as yet forthcoming, what had become clear was that an insidious and life threatening infection was rapidly taking over Acer’s body, and as a result of this he had to be admitted to theatre and placed on a ventilator.

At the same time Axel, whilst deemed “stable”, has also become quite poorly.

It was at this point that the true horror of our predicament started to become apparent.

We were told that Acer needed intensive care - yet there were no paediatric ICU beds available in the country…

Hours passed by agonisingly slowly whilst Acer clung on to life, seemingly by a thread.

Eventually, news came in that there was a place available at Sheffield, but agonisingly by this time, Acer was deemed too poorly to survive a journey of that length.

More time passed, and after more conference calls and discussion by the relevant consultants, a place was created for him at the RVI Newcastle.

In due course, the specialist paediatric NECTAR ambulance service came down from the RVI to collect him, and he was blue lighted straight to paediatric ICU at the RVI.

At this point, we were told to prepare ourselves for the worst, as this was now a matter of life and death for Acer, and was something that as brand new parents of five day old twin boys, instantly delivered a monstrous roller coaster of so much pure, raw fear and anxiety, that I cannot even attempt to put it into words.

Thankfully, the journey went smoothly, and Acer arrived at PICU at the RVI safely to start treatment.

Twenty four hours later, Axel, still at Darlington Hospital, stopped breathing…

Like a nightmare version of the movie Ground Hogg Day, Axel too, went down to theatre and was put on a ventilator.

This time, the NECTAR ambulance team from the RVI Newcastle were able to come down to collect him before he had degenerated quite as much as his brother before him, though he still needed ventilating,​ and a place was made for him at the RVI next to his twin brother in PICU.

We will never be able to thank the RVI enough for this, because it at least allowed us to be in the same place together, to try to face this nightmare as a family unit, rather than one parent and baby at Darlington, and the other parent and twin at Newcastle.

Four more days passed in PICU, with seemingly countless trips to theatre, tests, and transfusions of blood platelets being undertaken.

After what seemed like an eternity, we finally received a confirmed diagnosis of Viral Meningitis, after a lumbar puncture procedure to collect a sample of spinal fluid from Axel (Acer was not yet deemed strong enough for this).

This now allowed a much more targeted, incisive, and effective approach to treatment by the truly magnificent staff at the hospital, and after (what seemed like!) a lifetime in hospital, and five days in paediatric intensive care, we began to almost cautiously allow ourselves to dare to believe that things were, in fact going to turn out alright.

We were finally able to bring both our little boys home on the afternoon of the seventeenth of December.

As a family, we feel an overwhelming need to raise awareness of just how incredible this hospital, and all the staff within it actually is, and also of Crawford House.

Crawford House is a charity funded house run by

#TheSickChildrensTrust, it provides accommodation on site for the parents of very sick children.

This gave us a room to stay in, within hospital grounds, allowing us to spend maximum precious time with our little boys, not having to worry about commuting daily, allowing us to be by their bedsides day and night.

Crawford House rely’s purely on public charitable donations, and we feel very strongly that we should try to help raise both awareness, and even more importantly money, to allow other families with similar needs to us to benefit from this fantastic facility.

Unless you have experienced something like this yourself as a parent, it is impossible to understand just how vital this amazing place is.

Any donation towards this amazing charity to help other families in need like we were would be hugely appreciated.

Lots of love - The Ayres x