Steve & Rebecca Holdcroft pictured after the London Marathon

 

Stephen Holdcroft had a very specific reason for running in the Flora London Marathon. His wife Rebecca tells the story:

 

Our son Dylan Etienne was born on 25^th Sept 2002 and, as new parents we were absolutely thrilled to bits with him. He fed really well and seemed to settle down into a routine straight away. One nurse was a little concerned at his first bath and wouldn’t bathe him because she said he was a dusky colour and so he was checked and given the all clear. When we were in the Wordsley maternity hospital the paediatrician came to check him over before we were released, again we were told he was fine. So the three of us went off to settle into, what we thought would be an easy start. 

 

We had a number of different midwives when we came out of hospital due to the weekend, shifts and staffing, each time they commented on Dylan’s dusky appearance and each time we defended it because he had been checked by health professionals. He had the heal prick test at one week old and his mouth and tongue went blue so the midwife sent us to an emergency doctor who sent us to Russells Hall hospital. Again we were made to feel that we had brought a healthy baby to the hospital. They were not equipped to deal with this tiny baby. We were asked “does this look like a sick baby to you?” How wrong they were.

 

We went home and got over the initial problems but then just before Dylan was 3 weeks old on 18^th October we noticed that he was developing a horrible cough which sounded like it was on his chest. By this time Steve was back at work from paternity leave, so I took Dylan to a doctor’s appointment. The Doctor said he could here a murmur in Dylan’s heart and asked why I wasn’t shocked. To be honest we were relieved to know what it was and that we could deal with it. He sent us to Wordsley children’s hospital, part of where Dylan was born. So Steve left work and with no sense of urgency we drove to the hospital.

 

Upon arrival they were waiting for us and we felt like we were in a scene from casualty as they told us we had a very sick child with a chest infection and a serious heart problem. Our world fell apart and Dylan was taken to the special care baby unit where he was monitored whilst the hospital phoned BCH to have Dr Stumper come and assess him because they believed Dylan to be too sick to travel.

In the mean time we informed grandparents who rallied round while we waited. Dr Stumper arrived and did an ECG which confirmed that Dylan had TGA with pulmonary stenosis. He then performed a balloon septostomy which kept his heart working while he awaited corrective surgery. Over the next week Dylan was treated for his chest infection and we were then sent home to await his surgery. In the meantime we managed to have Dylan baptised at our local church with just the god parents and grandparents.

 

On 29^th October we went to BCH ready for Dylan’s surgery. We prepared ourselves as well as we could and had looked at lots of information in the meantime about Dylan’s condition. The first night we slept on the coffee room floor of ward 11 but the next day the cardiac liaison nurse Jane said that she would have us some accommodation by the end of the day. We went with Dylan for his surgery and then went into town to buy him a present which would make the wait a little easier. We nearly jumped out of our skin in Beatties when Jane phoned us to tell us she had found us a place in Edward’s House. It was then that we found a home from home with wonderful staff and an escape from intensive care and the hospital in general.

 

Thankfully Dylan was ‘fixed’ and will hopefully not have any surgery in the future. We stayed at Edwards House until 5^th November when we left to fireworks which seemed an appropriate way to leave.

 

That it why it was important to us to raise money for the trust by Steve running the London marathon this year.

 

Dylan is now nearly 5 and a bundle of energy and we have a beautiful daughter Eleanor Alice who arrived, appropriately, on 18^th October 2005, exactly 3 years after the discovery of Dylan’s ‘little problem’. Two very careful parents made sure that she was checked and double checked before we left the hospital……

 

 

 

Steve on the run

 

Going to the London marathon was a fantastic experience for us all, and even though Eleanor slept through when Daddy ran past us at mile 25 we were all thrilled with the experience. It was a glorious day weather wise as well with temperatures reaching 22 degrees! This was Steve’s first marathon, and although he is a club runner (running for Dudley Kingswinford) you never quite know how it will go. The preparations had begun way back in the winter and many miles had been plodded to get to the start. The atmosphere was like a carnival and was summed up by the generosity of a family on the tube who gave a donation to our cause when Becky told them the story.