Lois Olivia was a very happy contented baby until Sunday 7th June 2009.
She woke up as normal and had her breakfast. Then at 12noon she became very sleepy, she fell asleep and didn't wake up till 2pm, which wasn't normal for her.
When she woke she was very clingy and upset and just wanted to sleep. She had a very high temperature. I rang the emergency doctors and was given an appointment for 6:30pm to attend Mandoc clinic at the MRI. They suspected it was chicken pox, so I was advised to go home, carry on with the Calpol and apply calamine lotion and plenty of fluids.
By 11:00pm, Lois had a red rash which was spreading quickly. I rang the emergency doctors back. They said it could be a viral infection and to just keep up with the fluids. I wasn't sure, so I took Lois back to the MRI hospital. They then took one look at Lois and rushed her off to the resuscitation department. All they kept telling me and my partner was that it was bad and they were trying to get us into the relatives room, but we wouldn't leave her. A team of specialists were called from Pendlebury. There were lots of different doctors and people rushing round her trying to stabilise her and work out what was wrong.
We were then transferred to Pendlebury Children's Hospital but we weren't allowed to travel with her. We were later told they didn't think she would make it through the journey. When we arrived at Pendlebury we were taken to a side room and Lois was taken straight to ICU where she was ventilated and hooked up to lots of different machines we didn't understand.