Friday 5th April 2019
Daniel, Sam and Tom's 3 and a half year old son, was being driven by his parents to hospital for a cardiac catheterisation to treat the atrial septal defect that he had had since he was a foetus in Sam's womb. He was happily playing in the back with his favourite toy - the black and white border collie toy that had been through the washing machine far too many times - whilst Sam and Tom sat in the front going out of their minds with worry, but they had to remain strong for their child because Daniel wasn't worried one bit, and they wanted it to stay that way.
The cardiac catheterisation meant that Daniel wouldn't be having open heart surgery, he would only have a small incision made into his thigh where a catheter would be inserted into a blood vessel and travel up to his heart, but he would only receive a local anaesthetic; he would be wide awake during the operation. And because the Kent Family worked at the hospital, they had managed to get Daniel's consultant, Mr Solis, to agree to let one of the parents into the operating theatre to keep Daniel calm. But only one parent whilst the other would wait in the gallery watching the op. And because Sam was a nervous wreck, she had persuaded Tom to be the one to go with their son because he was much more likely to remain calm with their son whereas Sam probably wouldn't be able to refrain from appearing like she was about to cry.
Sam and Tom had packed a bag in the back for an overnight stay just in case, but they were hoping that Daniel would be discharged in the evening because if there were no complications, he was supposed to have a very quick recovery because the incision would be so small, almost like a cannula that went into most patient's hands.
"Right. Here we are." Tom announced as he pulled up in the hospital car park - Sam's hands had been shaking too much for her to drive.
"What if I have an accident? Will Dr Solly get mad at me?" Daniel asked timidly as Tom opened the back door and helped Daniel out onto his feet. It was his first time he would be staying somewhere other than his home and the crèche and he was worried about not being able to find the toilet.
"No Daniel, Mr Solis is nice and friendly, remember? And don't worry about having an accident, you hardly ever have one anymore and I'll remind you to go to the toilet every now and then okay?" Sam said as she grabbed the large holdall out of the boot and put it over her shoulder.
"Okay." Daniel nodded.
Sam could feel her heart beating faster as every minute passed because their son was going to be taken to theatre very soon and Tom was already getting changed into a pair of dark turquoise scrubs so that he could go into the theatre with their son who was in a hospital gown that had zoo animals all over it.
"I like it here." Daniel stated. The children's ward was quite open and airy with plenty of bright colours, ducks on the curtains that separated cubicles and paintings of various animals on the walls.
"Mm, it's very colourful isn't it?" Sam replied as she held his hand.
"Am I going to dead?" Daniel asked and Sam's eyes flew open at how her son could possibly ask such a thing, and how he had worded the question. Usually, she would correct him but it wasn't something that she wanted to repeat.
"No, you're not going to d... Everything's going to be okay. You and Daddy can talk about whatever you want and I'll be watching from not far away, and then when you come back here, there'll be a couple of surprises for you." Sam teased as she had received and bought cards and presents for Daniel saying get better soon etc.
"Don't cry." Daniel pleaded.
"I'm not. My eyes are just a bit watery, I must've gotten something in them." Sam forced a smile and thankfully she hadn't allowed a single tear to fall in front of him, though she had been very close.
"Good. I don't like it when you cry." Daniel stated.
"When do I cry?" Sam asked confusedly.
"I hear you at night sometimes." Daniel stated innocently.
"No darling, I wasn't crying I just... Look, I'm just a little bit stressed at the moment, but by tonight I'll be fine and everything will be alright. And we're all going to have your favourite dinner and a little party in the living room, how does that sound?" Sam asked.
"I feel sleepy." Daniel mumbled.
"Yeah, that'll be the sedative." Sam muttered. He had been given a mild sedative to keep him calm, just like many patients took before they had a MRI to keep them calm.
"How's my cheeky monkey feeling?" Tom asked cheerfully as he arrived with a stupid hospital cap on covering his hair that was the same colour as his and Mr Solis's scrubs.
"He's a bit tired." Sam stated.
"Right, I think we're ready for Daniel now." Mr Solis stated. "Are you ready to go Daniel?"
"Yes Mr Solly." Daniel nodded which caused all three adults to smile.
"Okay then, let's go." He said softly as they began wheeling the trolley away...
2pm
"You look like you're in a trance." Tom said softly as he looked across the bed of his sleeping son to see that his wife had been staring at the boy with a small smile tugging at her lips ever since he had come out of theatre, announced that he was going to have nap and has subsequently fallen fast asleep. "At least it's a happy trance." Tom added. Both were sitting on a chair either side of the bed where their child rested. There was a table across the end of his bed with an untouched stack of greetings cards and a small mound of wrapped presents on it but because Daniel had been so sleepy when he returned the the children's ward, he hadn't noticed them and so they were yet to be opened. There was a also a big blue helium balloon from the ladies in the crèche downstairs because they knew how much Daniel liked to watch balloons float about; it fascinated him.
"Sorry I've been ignoring you a bit lately. It's just..."
"I know, I understand." Tom said reassuringly. "Guess what we were talking about in theatre."
"What?"
"Daniel wants to be a doctor just like mummy and daddy when he's older." Tom grinned. "Admittedly, given a couple of hours he'll have probably changed that to being an astronaut and then a zoo keeper but it's a nice thought isn't it? We could be his mentors one day." Tom smirked.
"I don't think that would be allowed." Sam stated.
"Hehem, sorry to interrupt." Mr Solis announced his presence as he cleared his throat.
"No, it's fine." Tom smiled.
"Well looking at his obs, Daniel should be fine to go home this evening. Now he'll need to take it a bit easy for the next week or two but there's no need for him to be on bed rest or anything like that. And within a fortnight he should be back to normal. Just don't forget to bring him to his follow up appointments where a registrar will just give Daniel a quick check over and an ECG to check that everything is okay." Mr Solis explained.
"I can't thank you enough Mr Solis." Sam said as she rose to her feet and firmly shook his hand.
"As I'm sure you've said before Dr Kent, I'm only doing my job." Mr Solis said wisely. "Now I'd better get on but I will pop over to see Daniel before he's discharged okay?"
"Yes, thank you." Tom said gratefully.
"You're welcome." He smiled before he walked away.
"Mummy?" Daniel croaked as he opened his eyes after awakening from his snooze.
"I'm right here." Sam smiled as she sat back down next to him. "How're you feeling?"
"Hungry." Daniel replied and Tom chuckled before he pulled the table that went over the end of his bed closer until it was hovering over Daniel's lap.
"Why don't you open these?" Tom suggested. He knew that there were some of his favourite sweet treats in there somewhere.
"Are these all for me?" Daniel asked happily.
"Yep. The ones in the green wrapping paper are from me and mummy. And everything else has got a label on it. There's some from uncle Fletch, and there's even a present from some of your friends in the crèche." Tom replied. Daniel giggled before he went straight for the biggest box that was there rather than going for the cards first.
"How did I know you'd chose that one first?" Sam teased as she pulled the curtain around the cubicle because there were other poorly children resting and Sam didn't want to upset anyone else because her child was well unlike so many others on the ward. Daniel ripped the wrapping paper off to reveal a box containing a blue shiny scooter with two wheels at the back to prevent any accidents.
"Can I go on it now?" Daniel asked excitedly.
"Not now no. Maybe when we get home." Tom stated. "Here, I'll put that down here to give you some more room." He added as he lifted the box onto the floor.
Sam smiled to herself as she began to unpack the bag that she had packed in case of an emergency that they would have to stay overnight for. Tom was playing downstairs with Daniel and his new toys and Sam had already packed their things but when Sam reached her toiletry bag, she realised something. She held the unopened box of tampons in her hands and realised that when she had packed the bag a fortnight ago, she must've thought that she would be on. So she checked the calendar on her phone and realised that she was in fact due 7 days ago, and because her period sometimes lasted 7 or 8 days she had packed them to be on the safe side. She then realised that with the stress of Daniel's procedure, Sam hadn't taken her contraceptive pill in a long time and despite stopping the daily pill, she hadn't started bleeding. In fact, she had had no signs of her period whatsoever. Sam quickly packed the rest of her things away, put her purse in her pocket and pulled a hoodie on before she went downstairs.
"Come on mummy, you're missing the party." Tom stated from the living room where they had some cheerful music on the TV playing and Daniel was zooming around with his new action figure. Even after a minor operation, Daniel felt fine because whenever Sam or Tom changed the dressings for the small stitched incision on his thigh, they never let him see it and he didn't feel any different because of the painkillers.
"Um, I'm just going to take Shadow out for a quick walk okay? Then I'll come and join you and I'll put dinner on too." Sam said as she poked her head around the corner and grabbed Shadow's lead. Whenever Sam or Tom took the dogs out, they would rarely take all four unless they had their spouse with with them just in case so Sam saw no problem with taking only one dog, the most trustworthy with her.
"Yeah okay." Tom nodded so Sam attached the lead to the dog's collar and quickly left the house. Sam felt her heart rate increasing like she was doing something that she shouldn't have been doing, but nevertheless the kept on speed walking towards the local corner shop where she put Shadow's lead around a lamppost.
"Stay... Stay." Sam said slowly and sternly before she ran into the shop and returned moments later with a small blue and white striped shopping bag. She emptied the contents into her hoodie pocket and made her journey back to the house.
Sam had just washed her hands and was putting dinner on to cook in the kitchen when Daniel came in with a small foam football.
"Ah Daniel, just the man I was looking for. I've got an important task that needs doing. Do you think you're up to it?" Sam asked and Daniel eagerly nodded. "Okay, can you go and give this to daddy please?" Sam asked as she took a white stick with a blue end out of her pocket and handed it to the toddler.
"What is it?" Daniel asked curiously.
"It's just a bit of rubbish, your dad will know what it is." Sam smiled and so Daniel ran off and kicked the football along with him. Slowly, Sam poked her head around the living room door because she wanted to see his immediate reaction.
"Whatcha got there Daniel?" Tom asked.
"Rubbish." Daniel announced as he proudly handed the stick to Tom. It took a few seconds for it to click when Tom turned it over to see the screen. He then looked up to see his wife timidly leaning in the doorway.
"What I... You're serious? Baby number two?" Tom asked.
"You think I'd joke about something like this?"
"Oh my god, this is fantastic!" Tom laughed as he ran over and gave Sam a hug. "How many weeks are you?" He asked as he eventually let her go.
"Five, exactly." Sam stated.
"And I'm guessing that this is why you went out with Shadow, to get this?"
"Yeah." Sam nodded. "I suppose I must've forgotten to take a pill once about three weeks ago and then two weeks after that when I stopped taking the pill completely which I didn't mean to do either, I didn't start bleeding but I was too busy worrying about everything else to notice." Sam explained.
"I don't understand." Daniel stated confusedly as he tugged on Sam's trousers. "What's going on?"
"Er... You're going to have a little brother or sister in a few months." Sam stated nervously.
"Okay. Can I go and play on my scooter now?" Daniel asked as though he had no idea what Sam had just said or he had just ignored her.
"Of course you can, just stay where we can see you." Sam ordered so Daniel ran into the back garden, picked up his discarded scooter and began going up and down the patio leaving Sam and Tom to celebrate their special moment together.
"This is so bloody amazing!" Tom laughed.
"What if he or she has the same atrial septal defect as Daniel?" Sam asked worriedly as soon as the thought had popped into her head.
"One: the odds of that are very low, and two: if they do, then we know how well the surgery works don't we." Tom stated. "Don't focus on that. Focus on the fact that we're having another baby!" Tom laughed and Sam couldn't help but smile. "If you could pop it out a bit quicker than last time though, that would be great." Tom joked sarcastically.
"Ooh. No periods for at least 9 months again." Sam said happily.
"No but there's certainly a lot more hormones on the way."
"You love me really." Sam smiled. "Daniel didn't seem to care though." Sam said disappointedly.
"That's because he was too excited for his scooter. Besides, maybe it's a bit too early to explain it to him at the moment. Maybe we should leave it until you're actually showing so he can understand where his baby brother or sister is."
"Perhaps." Sam nodded in agreement. "Please let this one be a girl."
"And then we could have her middle name as Samantha just like Daniel's is Thomas. Hey. I've just realised, now you've got an excuse as to why you've been crying in the night for the last week!" Tom laughed.
"I was crying because our son was having surgery on his heart today." Sam argued.
"Yeah but I bet that you wouldn't have cried if you weren't pregnant." Tom stated and Sam shrugged as she supposed that he was probably right. "Did you put dinner on?" Tom asked.
"Oh no, I got distracted." Sam admitted.
"Shall we just order a takeaway? Daniel will be just as happy, if not happier that you're not cooking." Tom suggested.
"You're one to criticise about cooking." Sam remarked. "But remember from last time, nothing with hard boiled egg." Sam retorted and Tom laughed as he went into the kitchen to get the menus.
Sam was just pulling the square white plaster that had been covering five steristrips on her son's thigh off whilst Daniel laid down in bed and Tom had just read him a bedtime story.
"Ow mummy."
"I know it hurts but, look. All done now." Sam stated as she held up the plaster and then she put it in the small bedroom bin. "Right, just leave it to heal okay don't go playing with the stitches." Sam said sternly a she pulled his pyjama bottoms up and then pulled his duvet over him. "Night night." Sam whispered before she pecked him on the forehead.
"Night Daniel." Tom smiled as he did the same and then they switched his light off and both went to their bedroom. "I still can't believe that you're pregnant again." Tom grinned as he stripped down to his boxers.
"No, neither can I." Sam admitted. "I don't feel any different."
"Well I'm sure Shadow already knows. She's probably already thinking up how to protect you and our baby from me." Tom smirked.
"Oh yeah. Remember last time she nearly bit your hand off when you tried to touch my bump?" Sam laughed.
"Funnily enough, yeah I do remember that." Tom said sarcastically as he climbed into bed and Sam then got in next to him before they turned the lights out.
"I'm so glad Daniel's okay now." Sam whispered.
"I know. Now there's not as much stress on you and my baby." Tom smiled as he wrapped his arms around her abdomen and rested his hands where, just centimetres below, his second child nestled in his wife's womb.
"I kind of prefer babies not being planned; there's so much less pressure than there is if you planned a pregnancy and then you just wished that the test would be positive."
"Yeah, and I prefer finding out from my son giving me a pregnancy test. That was so cute." Tom chuckled.
"I only did that because I didn't know how to tell you myself." Sam admitted.
"What? Are you incapable of saying 'Tom I'm pregnant'?" Tom joked.
"No I just... I didn't want to say it so bluntly like that but I didn't know how else to phrase it other than 'I've got a bun in the oven.'"
"So if you're five weeks now, when must your due date be roughly?"
"Friday 29th November." Sam said quickly. "I already worked it out." She added. "Though if this one is anything like Daniel, they'll be a week late." Sam stated bluntly.
"Are you gonna breastfeed again?" Tom asked softly.
"Definitely."
"And are you going to want a home birth again?"
"Yeah, if you wouldn't mind delivering your second child." Sam smiled and Tom grinned like a Cheshire Cat.
"It would be my pleasure."
"Though I am a bit intrigued by a water birth." Sam admitted.
"Oh here we go! Are you just trying to have the most uncommon types of birth?" Tom laughed.
"No, I'm trying to experience the most pleasant birth and I did last time. I just think I might be able to manage the pain a bit better in the water. I'm pretty sure you can rent these pool things to put in your living room and then you could be in the water with me."
"What about Daniel? Are you going to want him there?" Tom asked.
"Um... I don't know. We'll have to speak to him a bit later on when he understands what's going to happen. Now shut up, I wanna get to sleep."
"Great, the hormones have started already." Tom chuckled.
Coming up: Sam experiences morning sickness, and a trip the park is never uneventful for the Kent Family when Daniel's life is put in danger by a rogue dog. Who will step up and protect him? And will there be consequences?
Thanks for reading, please review :)