My two baby daughters ended up on life support – the only symptom was coughing and we almost left it too late
A HORRIFIED dad watched as his little girl collapsed and turned grey after he gave her some banana to snack on.
Little Fiadh O'Halloran had just turned two and had been very poorly with a bad cough.
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Her parents Robert, 37, and Rebecca, 36, were preparing to take her to hospital and gave her a piece of banana to eat.
Robert was seized by panic when his daughter suddenly collapsed and stoped breathing, rushing out to the street for help with Fiadh cradled in his arms.
The tot was rushed to hospital, where her shocked parents were told their two-year-old would need to undergo lifesaving surgery and that a viral chest infection had left her struggling to breathe - making her more vulnerable to choking.
Sat by little Fiadh’s hospital bedside willing her to pull through, Robert thought he’d never experience something so awful ever again.
But in February, less than a year after Robert and Rebecca's harrowing ordeal, their youngest daughter Nuala was also struck down with a respiratory virus.
Nuala, one, struggled to breathe so much she ended up on a life support machine for a week and, again, the couple had to watch helplessly as their beloved daughter fought for her life.
“I never thought anything could be as bad as Fiadh being rushed to hospital and not knowing if she would be okay, but then when Nuala also fell ill too, I couldn’t believe it,” Robert, from Ipswich, said.
“It turns out that both our daughters are particularly susceptible to picking up respiratory viruses and doctors have no idea why.
"When they get a chest infection it hits them hard.”
The family's ordeal started when little Fiadh developed a cough that wouldn't go away in March last year, just two weeks after her second birthday.
Robert recalled: “She was diagnosed with bronchiolitis, and we were going back and forth to hospital for a week, as she was coughing so much and had lost her appetite.
“They gave us a reliever inhaler to help with her breathing, but by the end of the week, she was so bad, Rebecca and I decided to take her back to hospital.
"I was just getting her ready at around 8.30am when I gave her a piece of banana as she hadn’t eaten.
“Then suddenly, her temples turned grey, and her eyes began rolling back.
"Nuala was only a week old, and Rebecca was breast-feeding her when I shouted out that Fiadh had stopped breathing.”
When Fiadh fell unconscious, the panicked dad scooped her up and ran out of the house, screaming for help and begging her to breathe.
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Meanwhile, Rebecca immediately dialled 999.
Neighbours and passers-by ran over to Robert and a man driving by stopped and got out of his car to help.
Just as Rebecca began administering CPR, guided by a paramedic on the phone, the ambulance arrived.
“It was one of the scariest moments of our lives,” Robert said.
“The paramedics put Fiadh on oxygen straight away and told us she was very, very sick and had to get to hospital straight away.”
A team of doctors and nurses were waiting at hospital and swept Fiadh straight into intensive care.
I couldn’t fathom losing Fiadh. The operation only took an hour, but it was the longest hour of my life
Robert O'Halloran
“They couldn’t work out what was wrong with her at first," Robert recalled.
"Then a specialist team was brought in and one of the doctors said the piece of banana might have gone down the wrong hole because Fiadh had been struggling to breathe.
“They discovered she had an infection which was affecting her lung capacity and making it hard for her to breathe and that’s probably why, when I’d given her the banana, it had gone down the wrong way.
"So, it was a combination of her lungs being too weak because of the infection and the banana going down the wrong way which had caused her to stop breathing."
Fiadh had surgery to remove the banana from her airway. But because her lungs were so weak, the operation was high risk.
“I was such a mess I couldn’t even talk,” Robert said.
Bronchiolitis is a common chest infection that affects babies and children under two.
It's usually mild and can be treated at home, but it can be serious.
The early symptoms of bronchiolitis are similar to a cold, such as sneezing, a runny or blocked nose, a cough and a slightly high temperature of 38C.
A child with bronchiolitis may then get other symptoms, such as:
- Breathing more quickly
- Finding it difficult to feed or eat
- Noisy breathing (wheezing)
- Becoming irritable
Symptoms are usually worst between days three and five, and the cough usually gets better in three weeks.
You should ask for an urgent GP appointment of call 111 if:
- Your child has had a cold and it's getting worse
- Your child is feeding or eating much less than normal
- Your child has had a dry nappy for 12 hours or more, or shows other signs of dehydration
- Your baby is under three months and has a temperature of 38C, or is older than thee months and has a temperature of 39C or higher
- Your baby feels hotter than usual when you touch their back or chest, or feels sweaty
- Your child is very tired or irritable
Some children may have a higher risk of getting seriously ill with bronchiolitis because they were born prematurely, have a heart or lung condition or have a weakened immune system.
Bronchiolitis is caused by a viral infection, usually respiratory syncytial virus (RSV).
RSV is very common and spreads easily in coughs and sneezes. Almost all children get it at least once before they're two years old.
The RSV vaccine helps reduce their risk.
It's available on the NHS from 28 weeks of pregnancy. This will help protect your baby for the first few months after they're born.
It's also offered to adults aged 75 to 79.
Source: NHS
“I couldn’t fathom losing Fiadh. The operation only took an hour, but it was the longest hour of my life.
"Rebecca had had to stay home with Nuala and when I called her to give her the good news, we both broke down in tears.”
Thankfully, the surgery went well and after a week in intensive care, Faidh began to recover from her pneumonia with antibiotic treatment.
“The first thing she asked for when she came round was some banana – I couldn’t believe it,” Robert said.
“I half laughed, and half cried.”
Doctors thought the tot might have asthma, but she was too young for a proper diagnosis.
Once she was well enough, she was sent home with a preventer inhaler to be used daily in case she got breathless.
In January this year, Nuala also picked up a chest infection - it was like history repeating itself.
“Just like with Fiadh she had a bad cough, and I thought, ‘Oh no, here we go again'," Robert said.
"She was showing similar symptoms as her sister had and we took her to the hospital.
"Nuala was also given a reliever inhaler, and we were told it was bronchiolitis."
But Nuala’s condition also deteriorated and she was rushed to hospital on February 12, after wheezing and struggling to breathe during a family trip to Billericay.
Robert said: “She was put on a life support machine, and it was horrific seeing our tiny little girl covered in tubes.
"Rebecca and I just couldn’t believe we were having to go through the same thing again."
Thankfully, Nuala began to recover after only week in intensive care.
“Again, it seems like she’d picked up a respiratory infection and her lungs just hadn’t been able to cope,” Robert said.
“We don’t really know why because the girls are still so young, but it made me realise just how important lungs are and how serious things like this can get.”
After seeing Fiadh battle pneumonia, Robert decided to raise money for Asthma + Lung UK to help raise awareness of how serious lung conditions can be and signed up to run the London Marathon on April 27.
“I am running it for both of them now since Nuala was also hospitalised.
"I figure if my two girls can battle through such terrible illnesses, I can battle through 26 miles.
"And I am running for the next mum or dad who has to go to hospital and sit by their son or daughter’s bedside because they have a respiratory issue.”
You can make a donation to Robert’s fundraising page here.
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