Hi all..
As you may of seen alex_m started a thread congratulating me on with my new baby boy last weekend... I would like to share with you in brief the story and maybe, just may be you may change your mind and donate... just bear that last sentence in mind and read this story and it will become clear.
Saturday 26th May at 4.30am my wife wakes me up with bad pains and low and behold shes in labour with my first child.
By 6am we are up the Norfolk & Norwich hospital in the birthing unit just waiting...
By 9.13am my son , Reece arrives into the world... As many of you dads out there will know, when holding your 1st child is just so wonderfull yet words cant describe how you feel!
Now picture the following....
your wife has just given birth to your first child and your a proud dad etc, your emotions are sky high, BUT with in 30min out of the blue your wife/partner just collapses infront of you whilst your holding your new born baby...
The nurses and midwife's come rushing in, she goes white as a sheet.. just lifeless.. at this point i did not know what to think..
AND THEN ALL OF A SUDDEN while shes still out cold she loses 4PINTS of blood in 2 minutes!
Shes rushed through to an emergency ward, 13 nurses! are doing all they can to help my wife... at this point im still holding by son....
Then you have 4 surgeons come rushing through, there pagers going off etc etc, the nurses cant get no drip lines into my wifes arms, her vains have dropped and is still losing blood slowly..
I hear the worst sentence of my life whilst holding my boy: Her heart is about to stop and she cant breath!
At this point words can not describe how i felt as i said to alex at work, and to be honest i dont like talking about it, BUT as i say this could save a life....
The surgeon tells me she is 6min away from an operation to remove her womb as its badly torn and isnt contracting like it should.
But out of the blue, 4 HOURS LATER they get her stable and she comes round at 3pm.. i still have my son at this point....
Firstly with out going into detail and i must stress this is a very brief part of the story and what i witnessed, i know how close i was to losing my wife and my little boy not having a mum, but secondly i know we moan about them but the NHS staff that day saved my wife and kept us as a family..
The morale of the story is:
after all the blood my wife lost, if it wasnt for generous blood donors the worst may of happened!
i myself have been a blood donor for many years and made me realise just how special, and precious blood really is... 6 pints of blood for my wife was there, 3 pints just to get her blood levels to normal, another 3 as a top up as it were..
im sure some of you are blood donors and those that are will know you can only give 3 pints a year and takes roughly 20min each pint to give.
my wife lost just over 4 pints in 2 minutes... so basically a year and a bit donation by just 1 person and over an hour of there time helped my wife!
so i am asking, please if you can, even if its just once, and you want to do something to help someone please give blood, you never know who, when or why they may need it...