Thursday 14th June
Today is my 32nd birthday – one of the strangest birthdays ever. But I really don’t care. My birthday is irrelevant.
I can’t remember much of it. But I’m relieved that they aren’t planning on Maisie’s surgery today. She is doing really well and is stable, so they are hoping for Friday (tomorrow) or even Monday. I really don’t want her to have to stay like this with all these tubes until Monday – so I hope for tomorrow.
She is doing so well. She’s such a strong little fighter dealing with all of this. Just battling on.
And then the nurses give me the best birthday present I have ever (and will ever) have. I got to hold her. It was difficult and a bit scary with all of those tubes everywhere. They had to take her off the ventilator and manually ventilate her. But I loved it, and she loved it too. I got to hold her for the best part of an hour. She stared at me with her big eyes like she was asking “what’s going on? Where have you been all this time? Why aren’t you always holding me?” It was lovely to give her that bit of comfort. It was just perfect.
We are also told that she will be going into surgery tomorrow morning, probably as one of the first patients. It’s scary and so unknown. We talk through all the details with the doctors, and sign all of the papers. They are terrifying. They explain all of the things that could go wrong. But the papers also state that if the surgery isn’t performed, she will die. So we have no choice. It has 98% chance of success. This sounds incredibly high. But what about that 2%? 2% sounds so small. But it is still something. Maisie could be in that 2%. Although they do these operations all the time, it is still big surgery for such a tiny person.
That evening, Ben and I go out for dinner, and we make a toast to my birthday, and we make a toast to Maisie. Tomorrow is going to be a big day.