At 2 am on a Friday morning I was awoken to a sound coming from my 2 month olds crib, a sound no mother would ever want to hear. He was almost unresponsive and struggling to breathe.
After a very emotional day being flown from hospitals in rural NSW, we arrived at the Gold Coast University Hospital where baby James was put in critical care on life support. He was diagnosed with sepsis meningitis – an infection that attacks the brain. We were devastated, emotionally and
physically exhausted and distraught with no family on the Gold Coast.
We spent the first few hours of sleep we had after 48 hours in our car, not being able to find accommodation at 3am in the morning after everything had settled down. That’s when we were contacted by a Social Worker who had been in contact with the amazing team from The Mooring.
They provided us with a beautiful unit right near the hospital, relieving us of all burdens and worrying. What we thought would be a two week course of antibiotics turned into a six week stay and they helped us through the whole time, checking we had everything we needed whilst also giving us a safe haven to grieve and emotionally work through the difficult time we had ahead of us.
After strong courses of antibiotics and MRI after MRI, spinal taps and CT scans, we were able to be blessed enough to do CHITH (Children’s Hospital in the Home). Living hundreds of kilometres away from the hospital, the kind people at The Mooring allowed us to stay and have the treatments at the unit they had provided us with.
Everyday we had a nurse come to the unit to administer antibiotics and check all of his vital organs and body movements. We were lucky enough to escape this infection with no loss of limbs or hearing or even eye sight to our beautifully baby boy. At one point we were even able to
bring our other three children to stay with us, making us a family again after many weeks apart.
One week after James turned four months old we were able to go home with a thriving vibrant bundle of joy. Had The Mooring not been there to help us in our darkest hours I don’t know if we as a family would have gotten through this ordeal as greatly as we did. Not only did they provide
us with a sanctuary, but restored our faith in our Lord and Saviour. It is a debt we can never repay but every one of their beautiful team are forever in our thought and prayers.
James is now six months old and while he is out of the storm, we still have a long way for a full recovery. This is our story of how The Mooring saved us.
