Written by mum in Aug’ 2000

My Early Days

Hello everyone, my name is Jade Eve Flynn Hurley (I know, what a mouthful, I can thank my mum and dad for that), Jade for short. I was born at 05:20am GMT on the 15^th April 1998 in the Eirnville Hospital in Cork, Ireland. The doctors didn’t know at first what I had, but informed my mum and dad the next day that it was Apert’s Syndrome. I spent two nights in the Neo-Natal ward, a ward for special babies, and a further three in my mum’s room before being sent out into the big bad world.

When I was born my mum (Imelda) and dad (Dermot) were still in college, mum in Cork and dad in Limerick, Cork and Limerick are about 60 miles apart. So I think that I caused quite a stir, especially when they both had exams a month after I was born. We lived for the first two months of my life in rented accommodation with wonderful friends of my mum’s. Then when mum and dad finished their exams we moved to Mayo (a long way from Cork), to live with my grandparents for a few months. Then back to Cork for more of the college life.

Surgery

I had my first taste of surgery (Temple St. Children’s Hospital in Dublin) when I was 6 mths old, pallet repair, but I didn’t really like that too much. The only good thing was that they pumped me full of drugs, I was flying it. Then I had to spend more time in hospital, but this time in Cork, I got a nasty bout of Bronchitis. I had barely recovered from that when they had me back in surgery, this time to get my right thumb released. Boy did I have fun with that when I eventually got to play with it. Then if things weren’t bad enough, I was back in Hospital in Cork before I knew it with another bout of Bronchitis. My God! The things a six month old has to put up with. They gave me a bit of a rest then for about a month.

After a check up on my pallet the surgeon told me … well told my parents that he had messed up (not his exact words) when doing my pallet repair and I’d have to have to re –repaired (if that’s a word). I was great friends with the surgical staff by this stage. That was it with the big surgery for a while, but I had a yukee ingrown nail on my left that I had to get removed every two months, t was really, really sore, and I had to go under anaesthetic to get it removed.

A few months later I had my left thumb released and after that I had my right pinkie released in October 1999. I think that they forgot about me after that, as I haven’t had any surgery since, not that I’m complaining. But my mum and dad, they’re complaining a lot. You think that they’d be happy that I didn’t have to have surgery, but no, they give out and tell the doctor they want more. MORE surgery, you’d think that I’d had enough.

Anyway then came the winter again, but this time we were living in Limerick. So I got to have a holiday in the children’s ward in Limerick Regional Hospital, when I developed a bout of pneumonia. It wasn’t too bad though cause I got to make loads of friend, and I wasn’t there too long this time.

Family & Friends

I have a very big family (no siblings though), my mum comes from a family of six children (Mayo) and my dad from a family of eight children (Roscommon), so I’ve loads of Aunts and Uncles to spoil me, not to mention my two Granny’s and two Granddad’s and believe it or not a Great-Granddad and a Great-GrandAunt. I have five cousins all around my age and we’re great friend’s altogether. Unfortunately I only get to see them about twice a month as they live so far away.

My best friend’s name is Adam. He lives next door to my Granny in Mayo. He was born six days after me, isn’t that cool. We fight sometimes but we have great fun together.

Present Days

I now live in Limerick with my mum & dad. We moved up here last year so my dad could finish his last year in University, mum took a year off. I was in the crèche all year, which I loved, I made loads and loads of friends there. But we’re moving back down to Cork in three weeks so mum can go back to college. I really wonder what the attraction is!

Well that all about me. If there is anyone out there from Ireland that would like to contact my parents you can phone the on 087 8673394 or if there is anyone from anywhere in the world that would like to e-mail my mum you can do so at irishapert@yahoo.com or my dad at dermotjhurley@yahoo.com

Take care everybody and enjoy your hospital stays ….. well as much as possible. It’s a great place to make friends and have fun.