Every 5 minutes, a baby is admitted to neonatal care in the UK.

Ethan was born on 25th March 2019 – just over 12 weeks before his due date, weighing 3lb1oz (1.4kg). Ethan arriving so early came as a huge shock. We were lucky that he was born at a hospital with such an exceptional Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU).

We quickly became familiar with the world of neonatal intensive care – an area we had previously been blissfully unaware of. Ethan had what was considered a 'straight forward' journey in NICU. He essentially needed to stay in hospital to grow. However, we would still have to hold our breaths waiting for results of how his brain bleed was healing, if his heart murmur was closing, watching him turn blue when he'd forget to breathe. Ethan was in the NICU for almost 10 weeks (67 days to be precise)

The constant alarms around Ethan would become white noise but going home every night without our baby never got easier. Despite this, we were comforted knowing he was in the best care. I was blown away by the compassion and professionalism of all the doctors and nurses we met there. They gave us hope and reassurance on a daily basis. They taught us what all the beeping machines meant and eventually helped us learn to ignore them. They taught us how to care for our fragile baby. Finally, after what felt like a lifetime, on 30th May 2019, Ethan was well enough to come home! 

Bliss volunteers were part of our journey and we were grateful to have someone to talk to.  The Bliss team organised a mothers day coffee morning whilst we were in the unit which was a great opportunity to meet parents in a similar situation.  Since being discharged we've followed the work that Bliss are doing and they have been instrumental in pushing policy change like the introduction of paid neonatal leave for parents.

Ethan, Grace, Lucas and Milo will be walking a lap of Bloomiehall Park waving their lights to shine a light on prematurity on Saturday 20th November. (This will be no mean feat as they will need to walk past the play park to do so!)  

Bliss is the leading UK charity for babies born premature or sick. They rely on donations to fund their work, and without our help they won't be able to reach the 100,000 babies needing neonatal care each year.

Your donation to our page will help Bliss to drive improvements in neonatal care, to ensure that the needs of babies are at the heart of policy and planning for the future, and to provide information and support to all families with a baby born premature or sick.