When your child needs hospital care, nothing else matters. In this episode, I share our family’s personal experience at Starship Hospital in Auckland, one of New Zealand’s leading children’s hospitals.
From the emotional toll to the incredible support from staff, I open up about what it’s really like when your child needs urgent care in a new country. I also talk about how New Zealand’s children’s hospital system works, what immigrant families should expect, and how you can prepare if you ever face this situation.
Whether you’re already in New Zealand or planning your move, this is an honest look at a side of life many don’t think about — but every parent should know.
What you’ll learn in this episode:
-
Our daughter’s Starship Hospital story
-
How children’s hospitals work in New Zealand
-
The challenges (and relief) of getting care as a parent
-
What immigrant families should expect if their child needs medical attention
✨ If you’re immigrating to New Zealand, or already settling here, I hope this episode gives you reassurance and practical insight.
Stay Connected
Follow my Soft Landing podcast and subscribe to my YouTube channel @softlandingnz for real stories, walkthroughs, and practical tips for newcomers to New Zealand.
📍 All links & platforms: https://linktr.ee/softlandingnz
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Hey everyone.
First of, I just want to say welcome back.
Thanks for those that havebeen listening to me regularly.
I really appreciate youlistening to my podcast.
For those of you that are joiningus for the first time, welcome.
I do encourage you if you, if thisis the first podcast you're listening
to, to try and go listen to my veryfirst podcast, or at least the first
(00:20):
few, 'cause it gives you a littlebit of an understanding of who I am.
And what I'm trying to do and achievewith this podcast and why you should
even consider listening to thecontent that I'm putting out there.
So try go to the first one andlisten from the beginning, otherwise.
Really awesome to have you join usand I hope you enjoy the podcast
that I'm gonna be sharing today.
So, first of, I just gottasay to everybody I know I
(00:42):
missed my podcast last week.
I really try my best to get out apodcast every Thursday, but last week
I wasn't able to get my podcast out andthat's kind of what I'm gonna talk about
a little bit today and explain why.
So first I apologize for that,but I just wanted to explain why.
So the last past week and ahalf my life has been turned.
Little bit upside down.
My wife and I, we've really had a roughweek and a half, and the reason we've
(01:05):
had a rough week is my daughter gotvery ill probably about two weeks back.
She got a, an ear infection.
Now look, she's five yearsold going to kindie, I promise
you the kindie no, I lie.
She's not a kindie anymore.
She's actually started in primary school.
Now she's in level one or year one.
But either way, kindy year one, whenthey're small, they go to school.
(01:26):
It's like a cesspool o of bugs.
So if you've got kids, Ipromise you it's the norm for
them to bring those bugs home.
They get ill and then they shareit with the rest of the family.
So it wasn't out of the ordinary forher to have picked something else up.
And it did start off with earaches.
So she, even at the school, theteacher contacted us and said to us,
Hey, your daughter's not herself.
(01:48):
She's usually quite a. A bubbly,full of energy, easygoing type.
She's actually full ofenergy and really awesome.
But when she's miserable or feelinga bit sore she gets quite miserable.
And she's just as all of us, she'snot the most fun person to be around.
And the teacher picked up thatshe wasn't her normal self.
So we just had to keep an eye on it.
That night when she came home, she startedcomplaining about her ear being sore.
(02:11):
So you start the normal,you start with paracetamol.
When paracetamols not working or ifthey start getting a bit of a fever,
then you could consider ibuprofen yournormal meds that you give to your kids
to try and get all of that under control.
So we started that knowing it wasear infection here in New Zealand,
I have shared it on a lot of 'em.
Other podcast.
It is a challenge to geta GP appointment quickly.
(02:33):
Usually it takes they're very busy,so to get an appointment quickly can
take a day two, sometimes even as muchas a week to get that appointment.
So you either gotta go sit inemergency, which could be for hours
to be able to see somebody dependingon the triage and the priority of the.
The cases that are sitting in emergencyat that particular time or you've
(02:54):
gotta wait till you can actuallyget your appointment with your gp.
Or what we've learned as well is thereis the facility where you can go and
make a online appointment with thedoctor and you can do an online consult.
So that online consultyou can get quite quickly.
You can usually get them withinthe same day or the very next day.
So because she wasn't well, we thought,okay, this is not out of the ordinary as
(03:15):
per se, but let's consult with the doctor.
We did the online consultation,spoke with the doctor, said, yep,
seems like, an ear infection.
What the, and with what's goingon and all the symptoms, we'll
prescribe an antibiotic and sheshould be okay in a couple of days,
but just see through their antibody.
So we started on antibiotic.
That was probably, oh, I thinkthat was on about the Wednesday.
(03:36):
It was about midweek whenthe teacher had picked it up.
And then we got the consult and we startedadministering the, I think it was the
Thursday, maybe even the Wednesday night.
We might have picked up the scriptfrom the pharmacy and got the
antibiotic and started the, an.
What we did notice after the antibioticis who she's, she got a bit of
(03:57):
diarrhea, which isn't abnormal.
'cause we also know our kids when they'vegone on antibiotics before, they have got
a runny stomach before, so, or diarrhea.
So this wasn't totallyout of character for what?
What was happen.
But what we did start noticingby the Thursday is not only was
she still suffering with the earache, and it was extremely sore.
(04:17):
She now had this runny stomach, butit was a different type of diarrhea.
This was like, for, and I, it's awfultalking about poop, but hey, if you're
a parent, you talk about these things.
But it start, it started lookinglike, best way to explain it was
like jam, like tar, like really jammysticky, a sticky mess and dark in
(04:37):
color, like really dark in color.
And that's what got us a little worried.
We were like this is not normal.
We've had diarrhea before when our kidshave been sick or had antibiotics or
whatever else, but this wasn't normal.
The, this wasn't the norm.
Not only that did we start noticing,but we also started eating.
She was extremely pale and thatwasn't normal color for her.
(04:59):
So this got us a little bit worried andwe thought it might be the antibiotics,
but we weren't sure that was by like.
I think we noticed by late theThursday, 'cause you had to give certain
amount of doses of the antibioticsand then it kicked in by the Friday.
We were really getting a littleworried and thought, no, there's
something not right here.
I think we need to consultwith the doctors again.
(05:20):
Again, trying to get an appointment.
We could only get one forthe following Tuesday.
We booked the appointmentanyway with the GP just in case.
'Cause we didn't know if we'dbe able to clear it up by then.
So let's just get the booking in.
But we started getting a little worried.
Anyway, long story short, whatwe realized is, no, this is, we
need to head off to emergency.
So on the Saturday morning, we decidedto take her through to the emergency.
(05:42):
Now where we stay, we are about an hournorth of CBD Auckland where we stay in New
Zealand, and there are emergencies nearus, so you could go to those emergencies.
But what we opted to do and on goodadvice from a lot of friends here is they
said, if your child is really not well.
Don't waste your time with tryingto go to an emergency locally.
(06:03):
Rather, if you're in the Auckland area,drive the extra distance if you can and
go to CBD and go to the hospital there.
They refer to the Children'sHospital as Starship.
It is where all the specialists wouldbe, everything that you would need all
in one place specializing with children.
So just do the extra trip and gointo C, B, D and go to Starship.
So that's what we did on Saturday morningand we drove all the way in and we waited.
(06:27):
Oh, I don't know.
Waiting room again, triage, she wasn'tunstable or anything like that, so
obviously anybody that was comingin that had broken arms or kids with
bleeding faces and all that would bea priority and they'd move forward.
So it did take a little while to beable to eventually see a doctor that
said, the nurse, as we arrived to takedown your details, and they did do.
(06:48):
Went through all the triage questionsand asked, okay, what are the symptoms?
What's going on?
How's she feeling at the moment?
Taking her vitals, temperature,heart rate, all the rest of it.
And they said, okay, cool.
They'll put you in the queue and you'llget your chances to see the doctor.
It did take a little whileto eventually see the doctor.
The doctor went through everything again.
My wife being as thorough she is, she tooka lot of photos of the poop so that we not
(07:11):
only were explaining what it looked like,but we could show the doctor a visual
of, Hey, this is what it looked like.
This was the first one, thesecond one, whatever else.
This is the medications IE theantibiotics we've been giving her.
The paracetamol, ibuprofen ibuprofen,everything that we've been giving it.
So you go through allof that with the doctor.
The doctor has a good feel, look.
Checks everything with her andsaid, okay, we're probably going to
(07:32):
need to do a bit of a blood test.
So it'll be a finger prick justto try and check and eliminate any
potential viruses that it could be.
So we'll do a little bit of further test,but from what it seems like the doctor
was saying it could be probably just.
A reaction to the antibioticantibiotics that she was on, but they
(07:54):
weren't a hundred percent sure, or itcould be a further viral infection.
But they were trying to doa process of elimination.
So at that stage we still weren'ttoo worried, but we're sitting
at the hospital, wa waitingfor further test to take place.
IE the blood test.
They went and did the finger prick.
Oh my goodness.
My daughter does not like needles.
So she did not like us afterdoing the finger prick.
But they got the blood out, whateverelse, they sent that off for tests.
(08:17):
Then you have to wait a littlewhile for those tests to come back,
for the doctors to be able to see.
Again, this was all on Saturday morning.
I think we were eventually gettinginto the late afternoon, so it
must have been closer to now.
We've been there since, I dunno whattime in the morning, but it's getting
closer to three in the afternoon.
So just to give you an idea, it's hoursthat you can wait to actually see someone.
So it's not a quick process in triage.
(08:39):
Okay.
But you've gotta understandthere's a lot of people that they.
They're seen.
It is a busy hospital and obviouslythey have to triage and the
ones that are most critical willjump the queue and go in first.
Okay?
So if your child is stable and not ina condition that is critical, you are
going to wait a lot longer, but you'reat least in the right place with all the
right doctors for them to do everything.
(09:00):
So try exercise the patients andunderstand where they're coming from.
I say this because I know by threeo'clock I was getting antsy and already
turning around to my wife and saying ifit was that critical and that urgent,
surely they would've called us by now.
So maybe it's, we go to the reception, wetell the doctors, Hey, I, she seems okay.
We've got the antibiotics.
(09:20):
You've looked at her.
You're not saying there's anything wrong.
Do we go home and the doctor phonesus if there's anything major and
then we come back, type thing.
As I was saying that the nursecame back to us and the doctor and
said, come, we need to talk to you.
Took us into the back room.
How to say the back room, but it is likeone of the off towards the back where the
rooms were for the doctors so she couldsit down and talk to us and she explained
(09:41):
to us, they were a little concerned.
They haven't picked up any virusesor anything like that, but looking
at her stool sample it's verydark in color and it's very jammy.
And that is a concern to thembecause that showed that there
was obviously blood in her stool.
And there's bleeding internally andgenerally when it's dark in color, it's
(10:03):
bleeding that's happening somewhere inthe upper part of the digestive system.
So we're talking like stomach,small intestines, something like
that is where there's bleeding.
So what they said they're going tounfortunately need to do is they're
gonna need to book us in overnight.
'cause they need to do further teststo try to pinpoint and find out
where this bleeding is coming from.
And what is the actualcause of the bleeding?
(10:24):
Was it just theantibiotics that caused it?
And if so, where is it and youknow, or is it a viral infection
or is it a bacterial infection?
What is the actual causeof this internal bleeding?
So this was already gone from og.
We had an ear infection, we'recoming in here for an ear infection,
took antibiotics, and now we'reworried about an internal bleed and
we're getting booked into hospital.
(10:44):
Okay.
So that's Saturday night.
We got booked into the hospital and theysaid that they would start with a x-ray.
So the first thing that we had to dowas take my daughter down for an x-ray.
That x-ray that's pretty straightforwardand easy for a child to do the x-ray.
I think what was probably a littlebit more difficult was doing all the
(11:04):
finger pricks and then eventuallyhaving to try to put an IV line in.
Needles.
Needles, little children, traumatic.
Very difficult.
That said, the nurses andthe doctors were really good.
They not only were there so many ofthem trying to help, they did even try
and help with place therapists thatwould try distract the child while
you're trying to do, and administerand put in IVs and whatever else.
(11:27):
So they really do try their best.
But my daughter definitely doesn't likeneedles, so it was really a tough one.
Anyway, getting back tomy story on my timeline.
So we went for the x-rays, wewere booked in on that Saturday.
The Sunday morning we were still in there.
They had got some of the bloodtests back, which eliminated that.
It wasn't a viral infection.
So they were still trying to figureout, well, what is potentially the cause
(11:49):
of the internal bleeding that she had.
The x-rays came back and showed thatthere was nothing that they could
see as per the x-ray of her abdomen.
So they told us what they wouldnow need to do is they need to
schedule her for another scan.
Which with the doctors thatwe were consulting, they said
could potentially lead towardsan internal bleed in children.
(12:10):
That's called a Mele bleed.
So they wanted to do a Mele test,which is another scan, but specifically
trying to find this Mele, which.
In essences in the digestive tract.
I think in the small intestinethere's like a deviation and they
explain that this deviation issomething that happens in it's rare.
It doesn't happen often, especiallyif there's symptoms from the actual
(12:35):
deviation in the small intestine.
It's really extremely rare.
This potentially could be whatthe cause of the bleed is.
So they wanna try to do the scansto try to see if that would happen.
But the scan couldn't happen on a Sunday.
It would only be able to happen onthe Monday when everybody was back
full staff compliment, whatever else.
So we're like, okay.
And obviously she's notcritical 'cause she's stable.
(12:56):
Although now we could startseeing in the bloods that her
hemoglobin levels were low.
So I think they were dropping, so theywere getting into the low nineties
on the weekend and by the Mondaymorning they were already in the
mid eighties and they were dropping.
So there was definitely a bleed andshe was definitely losing blood, which
is what was getting them concerned.
Hence, we were booked into the hospitaland hence they were trying to do the
(13:18):
test as a process of elimination to trywork out where the speed was coming from.
So the x-rays had come back negativeand they weren't showing anything.
The viruses come back negative.
So we were worried although.
My daughter still seemed okay.
Besides the ear ache, that was the biggestproblem that she was really having was
wa was the ear ache was still amazing,although she looked pale and she still
(13:39):
had the diarrhea and it still was darkin color and everything like that.
So we were in the hospital being mywife stayed in hospital with her.
I can tell you in star shop inthe Children's Hospital, they.
They give you a room for my daughter,and there's a bed there for my wife, so
my wife could actually stay with her.
And then what I was ending up doingis, because I've also got my son, is
(14:01):
I would travel home, look after him,get him all sorted out, travel back
to the hospital, everything all day,get them what they needed, then travel
back and forth and back and forth.
So that started obviously on theSunday and then again on the Monday.
I did speak to, to workextremely accommodating.
They were unbelievable.
They, to the point where actually mymanagers turned around and said, Brett.
'cause I was trying to juggle, Iwas trying to also work and take
(14:23):
my laptop into the office intothe office, into the hospital.
So I was trying to work in between workingafter hours, trying to juggle it all.
They eventually said to me, Brett,family first you just leave it.
Work will be here.
We'll look after it.
Why I'm sharing this is it justshows you the culture here about
family and ping family first.
And maybe I'm blessed that I founda company that's like that, but my
(14:47):
wife's company was exactly the same.
So in our opinion and our experiencesis showing us that the QE culture
where they talk about pittingfamily first, they live it.
And they were really pushingboth of us just to take time
off and go focus on your family.
And there's even a type of leave that youcan put in that comes off your sick leave.
Four, looking after your children.
So seriously they supported me like youwill not believe, and they supported
(15:12):
my wife doing the exact same thing.
So I just wanted to share this sothat it highlights to you that is
one of the things we've found aboutbeing here in New Zealand that is an
absolute positive over and above somany other things that I'm gonna share
in this story that I'm sharing today.
So getting back to the story and thetimeline is now we are sitting on
obviously the weekend we, my wifespent it in hospital with my daughter.
(15:34):
We've done some of the tests already,x-rays, blood tests, but it's not
finding anything conclusive yet.
So the Monday morning I was back atthe hospital after sorting out my son
and everything like that with my wife.
We went for that Mekelscan Mekel scan again.
Not much to the scan.
It's kind of like a CT scan whereshe just had to lay there, lay still.
It just takes time.
(15:55):
I mean, it must have been half an hour,45 minutes of them scanning all around
her abdomen trying to look for this me.
Then taking her back up to.
Her room and waiting forthe results of that scan.
I think the hardest part is doingthe blood tests every so often.
So they were constantly pricking herfingers to try and get blood out to try
and test test and see where her hemoglobinlevels were and they were dropping.
(16:17):
So I understand why they had to dothe test, but my daughter did not
like those tests at all, and it'sheartbreaking when you have to watch.
Your daughter going through somethingand forcing her to go through something
when actually besides her ear ache,she felt okay according to her.
So we are putting her throughpain to try and help her.
And you try, explain that toa 5-year-old, why they have to
(16:38):
go through pain to get better.
It just doesn't comprehend in their mind.
So it, it was really achallenging time for.
Not to mention what was also verydifficult is we had to get an IV line up.
My daughter had a total panic attack,like breakdown in trying to get an IV up.
She just totally refused to thepoint where we eventually had to
get the doctors to give her a bitof a sedative just to calm her down.
(17:02):
And I had to physically, even on theaerator where she was a bit loopy
and whatever, still had to physicallyhold her, sit with the doctors and
everything, putting up the ivy line.
So extremely traumatictrying to get that done.
But you understand it'sfor the good of your child.
So you do it, but it's still very hard.
I mean, my wife just couldn't,she to walk out the room in tears,
seeing how we're forcing her andshe's screaming, just let me go.
(17:25):
Don't do this.
It, it's traumatic.
And I'm not trying toshare this to get you all.
You know, feeling sorry forme or anything like that.
I'm just trying to explain thesituation that we're going through,
but more to explain how the nurses andthe doctors and the play therapists,
they were all there with us.
I must have had about nine people inthe room with me helping me, trying to
help my daughter blowing bubbles andtrying to distract her and whatever else.
(17:46):
So they were phenomenal andtrying to help us even, although
it was as traumatic as it was.
So that was on the Monday when wewere trying to get the MEKEL scan.
They said post the medical scan results,which we got back, I think it was late
on the Monday night, they came back andsaid, okay, well X-rays are negative.
Mekel scan is also not found anything.
They're not finding anything in thebloods yet They can point to anything.
So what they're gonna trynow on the Tuesday is they
(18:07):
were gonna try an ultrasound.
So Tuesday morning, again, stillgoing through her, staying in the
hospital with my wife going through.
Constant monitoring and testingeven throughout the night.
So now my wife's gettingvery little sleep.
My daughter's not getting the bestsleep either because they have to
wake her up every so many hours tocheck all her vitals and whatever
else as they do in the hospital.
So it's all normal.
Just showing that you're gettingsleep deprived now as well.
(18:29):
I was also driving back and forthbetween CBD, which we're about an
hour north, so back and forth tolook after my son and everything,
and going back into the hospitalevery day, taking him what they need.
So Tuesday we were booked infor the ultrasound, got the
ultrasound down on the Tuesday.
Again, more finger pricks,constantly checking the blood,
which my daughter was hating.
That said, after about the fourthone, she started getting very brave.
(18:53):
So really proud of her.
But we started learning what to doand how to distract her and what
worked for her and what didn't.
So not something you ever wannahave to learn with your child, but.
We learned how to get the fingerpricks done in a less traumatic way.
Still not something that she enjoyed.
But anyway, got the ultrasoundsdone on the Tuesday.
(19:13):
Those results, unfortunately,also came back as negative.
They couldn't findanything on the ultrasound.
This is where we were startingto get a little worried because
now we had a team of doctors.
We didn't only have.
Surgical doctors assigned now becausethey were thinking potentially
there may be surgery that they'dhave to do to really find what the
cause of this internal bleed was.
They had a gee me in medical terms, butthere's a gastroenterologist or whatever.
(19:40):
It's a doctor that specialized isin the digestive system, so the
everything to do with the smallintestine the large intestine.
The internal digestive system.
Okay.
So we had that doctor that was assignedas well as a number of other specialists
and they were all consulting andtrying to work out what was wrong.
And they were very good in the waythat they constantly collaborated and
(20:02):
they were constantly trying to do aprocess of elimination, but they were
also trying to follow a process wherewe would stick to whatever was least
invasive to my daughter and cause her.
The last resort was to have todo any type of surgery, which
scared the hell out of us.
So that's really whatwe were trying to avoid.
(20:23):
So we were really hoping some of thesetests would pick something up by the
Tuesday nights and slash the Wednesdaymorning when they were talking to us
and saying, okay, well they've donethe medical test, it's negative.
They've done the x-rays.
They've come back negative, they'vedone the ultrasound, it's come back
negative and not finding anything.
They've done a blood test checkfor viruses, bacterias, whatever.
It's come back negative and there'sstill obviously a bleed because her
(20:46):
hemoglobin levels were still dropping.
So they weren't in the seventiesyet, which would've been danger,
like really considered dangerous,but they were in the eighties.
So you could see her heart rate waselevated 'cause it was working a lot
harder to get the lesser blood around hersystem to get oxygen around her system.
So we knew that there, wehad to find that bleed.
We had to figure out where she wasbleeding to be able to stop her.
(21:10):
And so it's very stressful being in thehospital when, you know, your little
5-year-old, there's something wrong.
But even the doctors can'tpinpoint what the cause is.
And without knowing what thecause is, you can't fix it.
And that's, it's stressful as hell.
It really is.
So what they told us on theWednesday, the plan would be, is
the next step would be to book herin or to put her under general.
(21:32):
Aesthetic where we, they would do a scope.
So they would do anendoscope and a gastroscope.
So they're gonna put a scope fromthe bot from the top and a scope from
the bottom to try have a look andsee if they could see where potential
internal bleeding was happening.
The only issues with the scope from bothends is the scope from the top would
be able to take the hole right the waydown through the stomach into the small
(21:55):
intestine, but it could only go so far.
The small intestine is meters and meterslong and they wouldn't be able to go
through the whole small intestine.
So if it was further down intothe small intestine that we're
gonna be able to pick that up.
But the scope.
Going from the bottom end, it'll gothrough all the large intestine all the
way to the beginning, ah, sorry, the endof the small intestine where it joins
to the large intestine, but wouldn't beable to see the whole small intestine.
(22:17):
So if the scopes didn't pick up anything,the next step after the scope where
they'd have to do keyhole surgery.
So that's where they would put a camerain from making an incision above her.
Belly button.
And then they would have to physicallyuse a camera on the outside of the small
intestine so it's inside of her abdomen,but on checking from the outside of the
(22:38):
small intestine to see if they could seeanything wrong and almost trying to work
their way along the small intestine.
And what they would have to do isif they find, found the problem on
the small intestine, they would thenhave to make a further incision on,
on, on her abdomen from her bellybutton, or depending on where.
They found the problem on the smallintestine to pull out her intestine
(23:01):
for where the problem is and theywould have to cut that piece out
and then rejoin her intestine.
So as a parent trying to hear thisabout your 5-year-old that was
healthy just a few days ago towhere she had an ear infection.
To where we are at the stagesnow where they're considering
doing surgery on your child.
(23:22):
And taking her insides out anddoing major, like, major surgery.
This was one of the scariestthings I've had to go through,
and I promise you, it is one thingwhen stuff is happening to you.
I mean, I've had cancer in my lifeand whatever, in my own surgeries and
whatever, but it's so different when it'syour child and there are so many thoughts
that are going through your head and allyou want is the best for them, but you're
(23:45):
also so scared at the same time, you'relike so scared to make the wrong decision.
And you really want to just advocatefor them, but make the right decisions.
But sometimes you, it's so hard toknow what those right decisions are to
the point where when the doctors hadspoke, and my wife and I threw all of
this on the Wednesday and said they'regonna book her in for the Thursday.
Typical of my wife and I, we dida whole lot of research and I know
(24:07):
people say, don't consult Google.
Okay?
But we consulted Google.
I'm in it as well.
I could not help myself.
I promise you.
You can't sleep.
So all you're doing is between consulting,chat, GPT, Google, whatever you're trying
to do, as much homework as possibleto try and get an understanding of
what was going on inside my daughter.
And with all the feedback that yougot from all these doctors, you just
(24:28):
wanna see is there anything else?
And this is where you start seeing stuffabout, oh, well, there was this capsule
camera that they could use that could goall the way through her digestive system.
And there's a CT scan that they could do.
And you know, there's.
You wanna exhaust every singlenon-invasive surgery option before
you, you cut my little girl open.
(24:49):
That's kind of like what you weretrying to push to the point where
after doing this research I said tomy wife, right, we are meeting with
this doctor on Thursday morning andthis is my wife and I talking till who
knows what time in the morning on, onWednesday morning trying to go through
everything that we are finding online.
So I said, I'm gonna be thereearly on Thursday morning,
we're gonna talk to this doctor.
And no ways they've gottapush, they've gotta find this
(25:09):
without having to cut it open.
So I left early on the Thursday morning'cause they, they scheduled her for
this procedure, meaning the scope aswell as potentially if they can't find
anything of scope, then doing thiskeyhole surgery and potentially the
surgery to actually mend her intestine.
And we hadn't signed the.
The, what do you call it?
The non, not the non-disclosure.
(25:29):
What's the word I'm looking for?
See?
Oh, my mind.
But we didn't give permission, mywife and I to, to the surgery yet.
We, we hadn't agreed to it yet becausewe were still got so many questions going
through our mind and the doctors weregood, they understood where we were coming
from and said, well, give it the night.
Think on it and we'll talkfirst thing in the morning.
So I did meet with the doctors,specifically the surgical doctors
first thing in the morning.
I take a step back.
(25:50):
I know I met with him on the Thursdaymorning, but it was also on the Wednesday
when I was still at the hospital.
Before we had even done this researchin that night, one of the doctors did
come up 'cause we said we wanted totalk to the doctors 'cause we had more
questions and we weren't happy to sign.
And it was because the, in prep forthe surgery on the Thursday, on the
Wednesday, the anesthetist came to meetwith us and he was talking through his
(26:11):
plan of pain management, et cetera.
And he started then talking to how the.
Potentially if they went as far as to cutit open, whereas talking about epidurals
and whatever else for pain relief.
And that, I think is what that was like.
The penny drop for my wifeand I, what we are going that
far on my little 5-year-old.
And that's when we were like, no worries.
We need to see further doctors.
We have more questions.
(26:32):
We are not signing this, we not okaywith this, but it's so hard to say that
because at the same time, you also want,you don't want to make the wrong decision
that threatens her life, but at the sametime you're like, how can it be that?
She's gone from a few days ago.
Okay.
And even looking at her now, besidesher ear a and paleness, that it's this
urgent that they have to go to thatdegree to do this type of surgery.
(26:55):
It was just like so hard to accept.
So we explained to him no as, as greatas he was, and he really was good
when he speak to the surgical team.
Another doctor.
It.
They seen one of the surgical team,but she was one of the younger doctors,
and I don't mean it in a disrespectfulway, but she sat in front of me and was
trying to explain this to me and I'masking my questions, but she couldn't
(27:15):
answer some of my questions because,you know, I can be full of shit.
I know it.
Okay.
I really was, as a parent I wasalso lack of sleep, whatever.
It's my daughter.
I even started getting a little bit.
Full of nonsense where I turnedaround and said, you know, I
sent my car into a mechanic.
I probably asked the mechanicmore questions than what asking
you, and I'm trying to entrust mydaughter, nevermind my car with you.
(27:36):
Okay.
Then I would start and I sawshe was young and I knew I was
just being full of nonsense.
I turned around and said,well, do you have a child?
And I knew the answer wasprobably gonna be no, and it was.
So I said, well then you can'tunderstand where we are coming from.
And she tried to relate to, I was actuallybeing so full and nonsense and I know
that now, but I was really trying to.
It's like you are angry, soyou're trying to push for answers.
Anyway, why I was telling you that isshe had to go away and had to call one
(27:58):
of the more senior doctors to talk to us,and that's why on the Thursday morning I
said, okay, before my wife and I will meetwith the more senior surgeons and chat
to them and see what this was all about.
That was on the Thursday morning.
I got in and I really started.
Going for this doctor and turningaround saying, no, you, you haven't
tried all the non-surgical, youhaven't tried everything to the end.
What about this capsule that we've read,capsule scope that she could swallow and
(28:21):
go through and they said, ah, you can't.
She's five years old.
Too small.
I said, rubbish.
I read up online.
A two to a 3-year-old can.
She started explaining to me howit potentially won't be able to
pick up what we are looking for.
At that stage, we thought it was amekel that we were looking for and
it wouldn't be able to pick it up.
And I do know even reading onGoogle, it said for a mekel.
It's probably not gonna be able to pickit up, but it is something you could
(28:44):
just on, insist on and try to do furthernon-invasive scans from the capsule.
It also said you could try a properCT scan and I was pushing over.
But then what about a CT scan?
You know, you suddenlybecome this expert in.
Challenging the experts, you know,but you're really trying to do it.
Understand you're comingfrom a place of worry.
You're coming from a place oftrying to do right by your child.
So it's really hard.
And I was pushing her on the CT scan andshe would, she was explaining to me, oh
(29:06):
yeah, but in her size and what's goingon and the way the CT scan works, it's
not gonna be a, anyway, the long storyshort is you were really challenging her
on everything, but she was brilliant.
She was, she didn't dismissme, she didn't talk down to me.
She was assertive.
Which is what I needed.
She came across as, you know, sheknows what she's talking about to
the point I was even asking her, youknow, how experienced she is and how
(29:30):
many of these surgeries has she done.
And I've read up that Mele is so rare.
Have you even done a Mele ha experiencein dealing with a medical before?
So this is kind of, I wasreally going hard for her.
Okay.
Which I know probablywas quite disrespectful.
But it was really coming from aplace of worry for my daughter.
She handled it brilliantly.
(29:50):
She calmed us down.
She said, I asked her, okay, fine.
Talk through the wholeprocedure from beginning to end.
Tell me about your process of elimination.
Explain to me why wehave to go to this point.
And she spoke through it stepby step even, although I may, I
probably asked her to repeat herself.
I dunno how many times.
But I needed peace of mindand I needed to know that.
(30:10):
Okay.
We've done everything we can,we gotta go through with this.
To the point where even after thatdiscussion in the morning, she said,
tell you what, don't sign this.
Now.
We've gone through all the steps.
We've gone through all the why's.
She's reassured if this is whatshe would do for her child.
She's explained all the risksand everything of whether we do
it or we don't do it, and eventold us it's still our choice.
(30:32):
If we only wanna go up to the point ofthe non-invasive and we don't wanna do the
surgery and we wanna wait and see if ithappens again and then come back, fine.
It's still our choice.
It's not her recommendations though.
But she explained why with allthe pros, cons, risks, everything.
So she was really good and she evendidn't force us to sign anything.
Then she said to us, think we booked forthe surgery later this morning, rather
come downstairs and then you tell ushow far we need to or are allowed to go.
(30:57):
Hardest decisions of.
One of the hottest decisionsI've ever had to make in my life.
Okay?
Not only you sleep deprived, you'reemotionally at your wit's end.
My wife was emotionally at her wits end.
And here we've got this littlelife that is, she's so perfect.
And here we gotta make this decisionwhere we are giving people we've
(31:19):
just met the permission to, if theyhave to go all to all the way to the.
The position of cutting my daughteropen and pulling her insides out
of her body to try and help her.
I mean, it was freaking me out.
Anyway, we got to the point where wewent down, booking her into the surgery,
(31:40):
going downstairs and we got speak toanesthetist and the gastrologist or
whatever they called, and the othersurgical doctors and all the rest of it,
and we said, okay, we are gonna sign over.
We are gonna give thepermission for you to.
Not only do the scopes not only dothe ol surgery, but if you have to go
to the point of even cutting it open,putting out her anti test, fix her,
(32:00):
find the bleed, and let's get her sortedso that is the right decision by her.
Now, I promise you, signing that,that form and giving permission
for that, it took everything in me.
I've never felt so worried in all mylife in a decision that I've made.
Generally, I am.
I know what I want.
(32:21):
I know what decision I'm gonnamake and I just go for it.
And I stick by and I knew thiswas the right thing, but I
was still as scared as shit.
I promise you.
I was so worried.
And that's on the Thursday morning.
I think it was actually past morning now.
'cause now we had been delayingby talking with all the doctors.
So we were close to midday,somewhere around there, midday,
(32:42):
one o'clock that they said, okay.
What have you agreed to?
And we said, we've agreed to it all.
We've signed it all off.
That's when the anesthetistgave us something to calm it
down, put her to started puttingher to sleep, whatever else.
All the other nurses, doctorswere coming by and we were gonna
wheel her off as my wife was goinginto the surgical rooms with her.
'cause only one parent could go in.
(33:03):
I got to sit down in the waitingroom and just said, I promise
you, I balled my eyes out.
It was.
I was trying to stay strong in frontof them, but it was so hard trying
to tell these doctors that You'vegot my daughter's life in your hands.
Please look after my baby girl.
Just look after her.
It was hard.
It was so hard.
And then God forbid ifanything went wrong.
(33:24):
I swear.
I don't know if I'dever be able to forgive.
So it was one of the hardestdecision, and I'm sure so many
parents have had to go through that.
I pray no parent ever has to go throughanything surgical with any of their
kids, especially when they're so small.
It's awful.
But anyway, the wheel are off.
I was in literally a puddlecrying in the corner giving.
(33:45):
Thought, just let it out.
She gives a crap.
Just cry, get it out and waitfor your wife to come out.
So I waited for my wife to come outand join me and that's when they
ex they explained to us, okay, youcan go to the waiting room, go get
something to eat, walk around, whatever.
'cause they did explain her surgerycould, depending on how far it had
to go, could be as long as three, alittle bit more than three hours long.
So we knew it was probablygonna be the longest three
(34:07):
hours of our lives waiting for.
It's where we got to,did we even find this?
And what was scaring me even more is ifwe've signed all this off, they'd done
all of this, they cut it open, theylook, and then they still can't find
the bleed, which scared me even more.
So I dunno.
Which I wanted, you know?
Well, actually I do.
I know what I wanted.
I wanted them to go in with the scopes,find the bleed, and didn't have to
(34:28):
do anything invasive surgery wise.
That's really what I wanted.
But I, because of everythingthat was going on, I'd almost.
Resigned to the fact that I don'tthink they're gonna find that.
I think they're gonna go allthe way to where they're going
to do surgery and they're goingto have to cut my door to open.
And we're trying to mentallyprepare for that and the recovery
and everything afterwards.
(34:49):
And that's where we weretrying to get ourselves to.
So while she was in surgery, my wife andI said, okay, let's just, we've got three
hours, so let's just try walk around.
We, we hadn't eaten since, I don'tknow, probably more than 24 hours now.
'cause when they started.
Prepping for the surgery,she couldn't eat.
And because it's a endoscope anda gastroscope they give her stuff
(35:11):
to clear out the digestive system.
So she wasn't able to eatand when she wasn't able, you
can't eat in front of her.
So we didn't eat in front of her.
And actually you didn'teven feel like eating.
So we hadn't eaten in a while and we,okay, let's just go get some food.
So we walked off.
And me also having celiac disease totry to find somewhere where you could
even buy food was a mission, but.
You kid we're just trying to walkoff to try and get something to eat.
We bought some, I think it wassushi or something that we found
(35:33):
that was gluten-free or whatever.
So we bought the sushi and we were goingto sit in an area where we could eat
and that's when my wife's phone rang.
And I promise your heart probablysinks and full think Jesus, it's only
been an hour while the hell over thephoning is what the hell's wrong.
Okay.
And that all these thoughtsare going through her head.
And I just saw my wife stopcrying and she's on the phone
because they gave her number.
Anyway.
What it turned out is the surgeonhad walked out of the surgery
(35:55):
to phone us, to let us know.
As they put in the scope, theyfound the bleed in her stomach.
I cannot tell you what a sense ofrelief that was, because what that
meant is they've now found the bleed.
We know what the cause is.
So this tar like poops that shewas getting that was full of blood
is, it's actually called a Molina.
Okay.
It's called Molina.
(36:15):
That's what my daughterhad, and it also meant that.
Because they found thisbleed in her stomach.
It's not a mele, so it's not a deviationof her small intestine, which didn't
need the surgery or anything like that.
It actually turned out thatit was an ulcer on in her
stomach that was the bleed.
So they're able to stop the bleed sothat the, this, the bleeding would stop
(36:35):
and then Mog globin would stop dropping.
They were able to just check the,from the scopes from the topping and
the bottom end that this was the onlybleed and that the whole surgical
team and everything was confident.
This is what the cause was.
Or the actual root causes, we had tosee what caused the actual ulcer and
what caused the bleed in the beginning.
That turns out it's a combination offrom the ear infection and all the
viruses that she's been having, she'sbeen having flus and everything over
(36:58):
the last few weeks bringing back fromschool and then us giving ibuprofen
and the antibiotic that she wenton, and potentially a bacteria that.
When the lining of the stomachgets broken down because of all
the medications and the viruses andeverything that she's had anywhere.
Long story short, it was a amalgamationof a whole lot of things that
eventually caused this ulcer, andthat's what caused the bleeding.
(37:19):
It's just so coincidental thatit all happened when we put her
on this antibiotic, but I guessthat's why all of this stuff
all came together for the worst.
It's like the perfect storm to causethis ulcer and bleed in her stomach.
But the good thing was this doctorhad been, and this is just another
point I'm trying to make, she.
She cared enough about our mentalwellbeing and knew how important it was
(37:40):
to us and how worried we were that shewalked out of the surgery to pick up her
phone, to phone us personally, to tellus, we don't have to do the surgery.
We don't have to go that far.
We found it with the scopes.
We are not going to be searched.
Cutting your door open, whichshe knew was our biggest worry.
So she didn't make us wait untilshe had got out of the surgery.
An hour or more later, she toldus straight away she actually
(38:02):
had, she cared enough about ourmental wellbeing as well to.
Take the time to make that call tous, which meant the world to us.
That meant we could sort ofbreathe and know that, hey, we
were just going back to recovery.
We just stop eating whatever we're eating.
Just get to recovery andgo see my daughter, okay?
(38:22):
And know that we've atleast found this bleed.
Now we can start treating it and gettingoutta here and on the road to recovery.
So that was on the Thursday afternoon.
She finally came out of recovery.
They spoke to us and explainedthe amalgamation of the perfect
storm that caused this ulcer andhow the bleeding has stopped now.
How are we gonna have to go onmedication for the next two months,
which will help that improve how wecan't give her ibuprofen et cetera and
(38:45):
how are we going treat this over thenext couple of months and everything
to get on to the road, to recovery.
But we're at least in the stage wherewe found what the issue is so we could
actually now start getting her better.
Which was relief in itself.
They did explain because her hemoglobinlevels had dropped as low as they had,
they recommended an iron infusion,which we gave them the go ahead for.
So they gave her an iron infusion justto try and help boost her system so that
(39:07):
she could start getting onto recovery.
It did mean she would have to stayin that Thursday night as well and
keep monitoring her, and only whenwe see that everything's on the road
to recovery, then we can dischargeher and actually bring her home.
Unfortunately on that Thursdayevening, she started running a fever
where it started spiking to 38.5or whatever, right up to 39 point.
(39:28):
Six or whatever it was, and wasstarting to get really dangerously high.
They said you can get a feverpost having an iron infusion.
That's one possibility.
The other possibility is she's beenin the hospital for about a week
and there is a lot of sick kids,so maybe she's picked up a virus.
She was already sick anyway with herear infection and stuff like that.
Maybe it could be an infection fromthe actual scopes that had gone in.
(39:48):
So now we have to do a process ofelimination, trying to work out well,
what is causing the fever to go away.
Although we found the bleed andwe've got the bleed under control
now we've got a fever to dealwith, which was a pain in the butt.
All we really wanted to do was getout of there now and get home and
know that she's getting better.
So that was on a Friday andmonitoring it all the time.
Unfortunately, getting fever everyfew hours and trying to manage it as
best we can with just paracetamol.
(40:11):
'cause you can't give anything elsebecause that'll compromise the bleed
in the stomach and whatever else.
So that was tough in itself.
Trying to get through theFriday and the Friday night.
On the Saturday is when theyeventually said to us, okay.
She's still got the fevers, but allthe tests we've done, 'cause they did
further blood tests, there's, we can'tpick up any of the other viruses.
We can't pick up COVID, we can't pickup any other bacterial infections.
(40:32):
So it potentially just because of theiron infusion that she's getting, the
fevers where we've just gotta keepmonitoring her and hopefully it'll break.
They wanted to keep her the Saturdaynight again until the Sunday and
only discharge her on the Sunday.
But, and that's a podcast for another day.
What we've also been in the process ofdoing is my sister-in-law passed away last
(40:53):
year and we are in the process of adoptingmy nephew and he's still in South Africa
and we're trying to get him adopted so wecan legally be his guardian so we can get
him to come join us here in New Zealand.
He's staying with another family.
There's no other fam, it's another family.
It's friends that he'sstaying with at the moment.
That are looking after him andthey're a godsend, but there's
(41:13):
no other family to adopt him inSouth Africa and look after him.
So that's why we'retrying to get him here.
But it's been 18 months, it'sbeen a slog with lawyers and back
and forth and all kinds of stuff.
And we finally got a virtual call on whatis our Saturday night, which is their
Saturday morning with the magistrate andthe lawyers and everything to hopefully
get this adoption over the line.
So we really needed to be hometo be able to do that as well.
(41:37):
We did explain this to the.
The doctors as well as the socialworkers, and they even sent somebody,
it was a shrink to talk to my wifebecause they were worried about
her, but she unpacked and explainedeverything that we're going through.
They were so helpful, andthey went out of the way.
They said, look, if you're still inthe hospital on a Saturday night, when
you have to meet with the magistrate,we'll even get you a boardroom
booked with internet connectivity.
(41:58):
So you can make sure you can dothat and still proceed with the
adoption that you're trying to do,even if you're sitting in the hall.
Hospital, it's just another waythat they were so willing to go over
and beyond to be able to help us.
So it was unbelievablehow they would help us.
So we were pushing to try gethome by Saturday night so that
we could do that online meetingwith the magistrate from home.
(42:18):
But we didn't understand that, thatwe had to stay in the hospital.
We at least had a plan B, and we coulddo that just talking about the support
that we had over and above the hospitalstaff, the nurses, the social workers,
the play therapists, the doctors, the.
The psychiatrist, every, therewere so many people that were
willing to help from the hospital.
Over and above that we had mydaughter's teacher that was
unbelievable with a class.
(42:39):
She got all my, my, my daughter'slittle friends to write little notes to
her and drew little pictures for her.
They bought her gifts and toys andto play with in the hospital, and
they got a chocolates and sweetssand all kinds of stuff, and they
put it in a box and they got it.
Couri it over to the hospital.
So she got to open it up at thehospital while she was there and her
stay, that was earlier on in the week.
(43:00):
So they were phenomenal with that.
Some of her other little friends',moms and dads put stuff together
put voice notes, video notes fromtheir kids, sent it off to us.
Sent other packages, carepackages to our house that I could
take through to the hospital.
They were unbelievable.
We had friends that we've just made.
It's actually people thatmy wife works with that.
They were unbelievable.
Not only the care packs and everythingthey put together, but they were willing
(43:22):
to come and look after my son here.
They were willing to driveto the hospital and help us.
They, people went out oftheir way to support us.
So the community has been phenomenal.
And why I'm telling you this as well isI've always said that my wife and I, it
was just tag team and it's us alone here.
But I think this was a bit ofan eye-opener, not only on how
amazing public hospitals are.
(43:46):
I don't think we got the service wewere getting in a public hospital and
the care that we were getting fromour daughter in private hospitals back
in South Africa, and I know maybe wehad a bad experience with the private
hospitals back in South Africa, but itjust blew my mind that this is a public
hospital and this is the service thatwe were getting and all the care that
we were getting, which was phenomenal.
I didn't even mention that therewere therapy dogs that came through,
(44:08):
so there's even people that comethrough and she got to, to hug and
play with little dogs and whatever.
It was amazing.
It was really amazing.
And this is a public cost.
So that is like huge, why I'm sograteful to be in this country.
But over and above that, the community,the teachers and the other friends and
whatever, that would reach out and beso willing to help us was, it's amazing.
It's, it just it's blown my mindhow so many people genuinely
(44:30):
care and wanna help and that's,the support has been phenomenal.
Absolutely phenomenal.
Anyway, get back to the story.
So that was on a Saturday.
'cause now we had to get back forthis meeting with the magistrate and
the lawyers and everything like that.
They did allow us to just chargeher and we did get to bring her home
on the Saturday night and we gotto have the call and whatever else.
We were still having the fevers.
But what they had arranged then isthey said they'll arrange for a nurse
(44:51):
to contact us on the Sunday, andif there were any issues, the nurse
would even come through to our houseand if need be, would take her back
to the hospital and whatever else.
So I'm sitting on Sunday.
Now it's Sunday afternoonthat I'm recording this.
Yeah, we've had a bit of a rough night.
She still had fevers, but we'venoticed over today the fever seems to
be under control, so she's actuallyheading in the right direction.
So we are finally getting to actuallybreathe and move in the right direction.
(45:14):
My wife is still off for the rest of thisweek and will still be looking after my
daughter, but why I want to share this isjust for those people that are thinking
about moving to New Zealand or you'rehere in New Zealand and you sometimes got
second sec. Second guessing your decisionto either move or that you've moved here.
This has proved to me that we've madethe right decision for our family.
You know, I know back in South AfricaI need to make sure we always had
(45:36):
enough money to have private medicaland whatever else, but here this is the
kind of healthcare system and peoplecomplain about the healthcare system here.
But I'm telling you, the experiencewe've had at Starship now in CBD Auckland
has been phenomenal with my daughter.
The doctors have been great.
The nurses have been phenomenal.
They've really been good.
The support in the communityhas been phenomenal.
(45:58):
Throughout an experience that hasbeen an experience I don't want any
parent to ever have to experience,and I'm sure other parents have been
experienced worse than what we have,
but having experienced it here,I'm grateful to be in this country
and for the support that we've had.
So it's just another big tick for mewhy New Zealand is a phenomenal country
and we are grateful for this opportunityto call this home and to be here.
(46:22):
So I really wanted to share this just to,with the whole purpose of Soft Landing is
trying to help other immigrants make NewZealand home share my experience to show
you that the community is there, they canhelp you, sometimes you don't realize it,
and don't have, don't be like me and haveto go through this to realize that you've
actually got a support structure and a c.
That'll help you, but it's alsoputting yourself out there and
(46:43):
getting involved with them.
But it is just to show you, there is acommunity, there is a support structure,
and the health system here does work.
Big thing, if you're inAuckland, don't waste time.
If you've got something wrong with yourchild, go straight through to Starship.
Don't even waste your time.
Just go straight there to the emergency.
They've got everything you need.
Even if you have to wait, be patient.
Don't be like me and get antsyafter a couple of hours and want
to leave because it could bethe worst decision ever because.
(47:06):
This actually proved that my daughterwas worse than what we actually realized.
So rather stay and getthe okay from the doctors.
But yeah been a rough week,but it's also taught me a lot.
Not only has it been the scariest timefor me with my daughter, but it's also
given me a lot of hope and a lot ofjust made me feel how grateful I am to
(47:26):
be in this country and grateful for thecommunity that we have that supported us.
And just also amazed at how wellmy wife has done, you know, she's.
Fricking super trooper, I swear.
Yeah, she's been emotional.
Yeah, she's been cryinga bit, rightfully so.
But she, you know, she, it just provedshe'll do anything for her kids and
goes out of her way and we can pulltogether and get through anything.
Okay.
Please don't challengeus with anything more.
We had enough challenges for now.
(47:47):
Please.
Side note, I didn't tellyou about the adoption.
I know it's another podcast foranother day, but we, it got signed off.
So the magistrate has grantedus as legal guardians.
My, my nephew will be herehopefully in the next month or so.
So, another big tick, big thing off ourshoulders and I'll do a podcast about
that another day, but just, it's been arough week, but we've made it through it.
We're still grinding on and we'llkeep going and we'll never give up.
(48:10):
But I just wanted to share with youguys, so if you've got queries about
the healthcare system here or you've.
You, you're having yourchallenges and hard time.
Also, if it can just inspire youto never give up, just keep going.
You know, you can get through it.
You have got a community that'll help you.
Just reach out.
Don't say no to the help.
If somebody's offeringyou, don't be too proud.
(48:31):
Just say yes, you know, we willalways the people back home,
that would help everyone else.
I'm always too proud to ask for help.
But one thing we've done hereis, you know, you just have to
sometimes just ask for that help.
And let them just give it to you.
You'll return it and pay it forward.
In weeks, months, years to come.
Just do the same for others.
With that, guys, I just wanted to, yeah.
Thank you for listening to my podcast.
I hope this resonated with some of youand would help in some sort of way.
(48:53):
And if it does, please share itwith others so that we can help
as many immigrants as possible.
Just settle in New Zealand.
The whole idea is to make New Zealandhome, help us as immigrants to pull
together, share our experiences,share what works, what doesn't,
and help us make this home.
So please share it with as manyother immigrants as possible and
follow and like my page, please.
(49:15):
Or not only just like, subscribe to myYouTube channel, it's at soft landing nz.
And let me know, you know, if there'sanything else you want me to share
or anything else that would help youguys reach out to me, let me know.
And yeah, I'll do a podcast on it ordo videos on it or reach out to other
people that can try and help with that.
Guys, just stay safe, stay strong.
(49:35):
And speak to you soon.
Keep up chat.
Hey everyone.
First of, I just want to say welcome back.
Thanks for those that havebeen listening to me regularly.
I really appreciate youlistening to my podcast.
For those of you that are joiningus for the first time, welcome.
I do encourage you if you, if thisis the first podcast you're listening
to, to try and go listen to my veryfirst podcast, or at least the first
(00:20):
few, 'cause it gives you a littlebit of an understanding of who I am.
And what I'm trying to do and achievewith this podcast and why you should
even consider listening to thecontent that I'm putting out there.
So try go to the first one andlisten from the beginning, otherwise.
Really awesome to have you join usand I hope you enjoy the podcast
that I'm gonna be sharing today.
So, first of, I just gottasay to everybody I know I
(00:42):
missed my podcast last week.
I really try my best to get out apodcast every Thursday, but last week
I wasn't able to get my podcast out andthat's kind of what I'm gonna talk about
a little bit today and explain why.
So first I apologize for that,but I just wanted to explain why.
So the last past week and ahalf my life has been turned.
Little bit upside down.
My wife and I, we've really had a roughweek and a half, and the reason we've
(01:05):
had a rough week is my daughter gotvery ill probably about two weeks back.
She got a, an ear infection.
Now look, she's five yearsold going to kindie, I promise
you the kindie no, I lie.
She's not a kindie anymore.
She's actually started in primary school.
Now she's in level one or year one.
But either way, kindy year one, whenthey're small, they go to school.
(01:26):
It's like a cesspool o of bugs.
So if you've got kids, Ipromise you it's the norm for
them to bring those bugs home.
They get ill and then they shareit with the rest of the family.
So it wasn't out of the ordinary forher to have picked something else up.
And it did start off with earaches.
So she, even at the school, theteacher contacted us and said to us,
Hey, your daughter's not herself.
(01:48):
She's usually quite a. A bubbly,full of energy, easygoing type.
She's actually full ofenergy and really awesome.
But when she's miserable or feelinga bit sore she gets quite miserable.
And she's just as all of us, she'snot the most fun person to be around.
And the teacher picked up thatshe wasn't her normal self.
So we just had to keep an eye on it.
That night when she came home, she startedcomplaining about her ear being sore.
(02:11):
So you start the normal,you start with paracetamol.
When paracetamols not working or ifthey start getting a bit of a fever,
then you could consider ibuprofen yournormal meds that you give to your kids
to try and get all of that under control.
So we started that knowing it wasear infection here in New Zealand,
I have shared it on a lot of 'em.
Other podcast.
It is a challenge to geta GP appointment quickly.
(02:33):
Usually it takes they're very busy,so to get an appointment quickly can
take a day two, sometimes even as muchas a week to get that appointment.
So you either gotta go sit inemergency, which could be for hours
to be able to see somebody dependingon the triage and the priority of the.
The cases that are sitting in emergencyat that particular time or you've
(02:54):
gotta wait till you can actuallyget your appointment with your gp.
Or what we've learned as well is thereis the facility where you can go and
make a online appointment with thedoctor and you can do an online consult.
So that online consultyou can get quite quickly.
You can usually get them withinthe same day or the very next day.
So because she wasn't well, we thought,okay, this is not out of the ordinary as
(03:15):
per se, but let's consult with the doctor.
We did the online consultation,spoke with the doctor, said, yep,
seems like, an ear infection.
What the, and with what's goingon and all the symptoms, we'll
prescribe an antibiotic and sheshould be okay in a couple of days,
but just see through their antibody.
So we started on antibiotic.
That was probably, oh, I thinkthat was on about the Wednesday.
(03:36):
It was about midweek whenthe teacher had picked it up.
And then we got the consult and we startedadministering the, I think it was the
Thursday, maybe even the Wednesday night.
We might have picked up the scriptfrom the pharmacy and got the
antibiotic and started the, an.
What we did notice after the antibioticis who she's, she got a bit of
(03:57):
diarrhea, which isn't abnormal.
'cause we also know our kids when they'vegone on antibiotics before, they have got
a runny stomach before, so, or diarrhea.
So this wasn't totallyout of character for what?
What was happen.
But what we did start noticingby the Thursday is not only was
she still suffering with the earache, and it was extremely sore.
(04:17):
She now had this runny stomach, butit was a different type of diarrhea.
This was like, for, and I, it's awfultalking about poop, but hey, if you're
a parent, you talk about these things.
But it start, it started lookinglike, best way to explain it was
like jam, like tar, like really jammysticky, a sticky mess and dark in
(04:37):
color, like really dark in color.
And that's what got us a little worried.
We were like this is not normal.
We've had diarrhea before when our kidshave been sick or had antibiotics or
whatever else, but this wasn't normal.
The, this wasn't the norm.
Not only that did we start noticing,but we also started eating.
She was extremely pale and thatwasn't normal color for her.
(04:59):
So this got us a little bit worried andwe thought it might be the antibiotics,
but we weren't sure that was by like.
I think we noticed by late theThursday, 'cause you had to give certain
amount of doses of the antibioticsand then it kicked in by the Friday.
We were really getting a littleworried and thought, no, there's
something not right here.
I think we need to consultwith the doctors again.
(05:20):
Again, trying to get an appointment.
We could only get one forthe following Tuesday.
We booked the appointmentanyway with the GP just in case.
'Cause we didn't know if we'dbe able to clear it up by then.
So let's just get the booking in.
But we started getting a little worried.
Anyway, long story short, whatwe realized is, no, this is, we
need to head off to emergency.
So on the Saturday morning, we decidedto take her through to the emergency.
(05:42):
Now where we stay, we are about an hournorth of CBD Auckland where we stay in New
Zealand, and there are emergencies nearus, so you could go to those emergencies.
But what we opted to do and on goodadvice from a lot of friends here is they
said, if your child is really not well.
Don't waste your time with tryingto go to an emergency locally.
(06:03):
Rather, if you're in the Auckland area,drive the extra distance if you can and
go to CBD and go to the hospital there.
They refer to the Children'sHospital as Starship.
It is where all the specialists wouldbe, everything that you would need all
in one place specializing with children.
So just do the extra trip and gointo C, B, D and go to Starship.
So that's what we did on Saturday morningand we drove all the way in and we waited.
(06:27):
Oh, I don't know.
Waiting room again, triage, she wasn'tunstable or anything like that, so
obviously anybody that was comingin that had broken arms or kids with
bleeding faces and all that would bea priority and they'd move forward.
So it did take a little while to beable to eventually see a doctor that
said, the nurse, as we arrived to takedown your details, and they did do.
(06:48):
Went through all the triage questionsand asked, okay, what are the symptoms?
What's going on?
How's she feeling at the moment?
Taking her vitals, temperature,heart rate, all the rest of it.
And they said, okay, cool.
They'll put you in the queue and you'llget your chances to see the doctor.
It did take a little whileto eventually see the doctor.
The doctor went through everything again.
My wife being as thorough she is, she tooka lot of photos of the poop so that we not
(07:11):
only were explaining what it looked like,but we could show the doctor a visual
of, Hey, this is what it looked like.
This was the first one, thesecond one, whatever else.
This is the medications IE theantibiotics we've been giving her.
The paracetamol, ibuprofen ibuprofen,everything that we've been giving it.
So you go through allof that with the doctor.
The doctor has a good feel, look.
Checks everything with her andsaid, okay, we're probably going to
(07:32):
need to do a bit of a blood test.
So it'll be a finger prick justto try and check and eliminate any
potential viruses that it could be.
So we'll do a little bit of further test,but from what it seems like the doctor
was saying it could be probably just.
A reaction to the antibioticantibiotics that she was on, but they
(07:54):
weren't a hundred percent sure, or itcould be a further viral infection.
But they were trying to doa process of elimination.
So at that stage we still weren'ttoo worried, but we're sitting
at the hospital, wa waitingfor further test to take place.
IE the blood test.
They went and did the finger prick.
Oh my goodness.
My daughter does not like needles.
So she did not like us afterdoing the finger prick.
But they got the blood out, whateverelse, they sent that off for tests.
(08:17):
Then you have to wait a littlewhile for those tests to come back,
for the doctors to be able to see.
Again, this was all on Saturday morning.
I think we were eventually gettinginto the late afternoon, so it
must have been closer to now.
We've been there since, I dunno whattime in the morning, but it's getting
closer to three in the afternoon.
So just to give you an idea, it's hoursthat you can wait to actually see someone.
So it's not a quick process in triage.
(08:39):
Okay.
But you've gotta understandthere's a lot of people that they.
They're seen.
It is a busy hospital and obviouslythey have to triage and the
ones that are most critical willjump the queue and go in first.
Okay?
So if your child is stable and not ina condition that is critical, you are
going to wait a lot longer, but you'reat least in the right place with all the
right doctors for them to do everything.
(09:00):
So try exercise the patients andunderstand where they're coming from.
I say this because I know by threeo'clock I was getting antsy and already
turning around to my wife and saying ifit was that critical and that urgent,
surely they would've called us by now.
So maybe it's, we go to the reception, wetell the doctors, Hey, I, she seems okay.
We've got the antibiotics.
(09:20):
You've looked at her.
You're not saying there's anything wrong.
Do we go home and the doctor phonesus if there's anything major and
then we come back, type thing.
As I was saying that the nursecame back to us and the doctor and
said, come, we need to talk to you.
Took us into the back room.
How to say the back room, but it is likeone of the off towards the back where the
rooms were for the doctors so she couldsit down and talk to us and she explained
(09:41):
to us, they were a little concerned.
They haven't picked up any virusesor anything like that, but looking
at her stool sample it's verydark in color and it's very jammy.
And that is a concern to thembecause that showed that there
was obviously blood in her stool.
And there's bleeding internally andgenerally when it's dark in color, it's
(10:03):
bleeding that's happening somewhere inthe upper part of the digestive system.
So we're talking like stomach,small intestines, something like
that is where there's bleeding.
So what they said they're going tounfortunately need to do is they're
gonna need to book us in overnight.
'cause they need to do further teststo try to pinpoint and find out
where this bleeding is coming from.
And what is the actualcause of the bleeding?
(10:24):
Was it just theantibiotics that caused it?
And if so, where is it and youknow, or is it a viral infection
or is it a bacterial infection?
What is the actual causeof this internal bleeding?
So this was already gone from og.
We had an ear infection, we'recoming in here for an ear infection,
took antibiotics, and now we'reworried about an internal bleed and
we're getting booked into hospital.
(10:44):
Okay.
So that's Saturday night.
We got booked into the hospital and theysaid that they would start with a x-ray.
So the first thing that we had to dowas take my daughter down for an x-ray.
That x-ray that's pretty straightforwardand easy for a child to do the x-ray.
I think what was probably a littlebit more difficult was doing all the
(11:04):
finger pricks and then eventuallyhaving to try to put an IV line in.
Needles.
Needles, little children, traumatic.
Very difficult.
That said, the nurses andthe doctors were really good.
They not only were there so many ofthem trying to help, they did even try
and help with place therapists thatwould try distract the child while
you're trying to do, and administerand put in IVs and whatever else.
(11:27):
So they really do try their best.
But my daughter definitely doesn't likeneedles, so it was really a tough one.
Anyway, getting back tomy story on my timeline.
So we went for the x-rays, wewere booked in on that Saturday.
The Sunday morning we were still in there.
They had got some of the bloodtests back, which eliminated that.
It wasn't a viral infection.
So they were still trying to figureout, well, what is potentially the cause
(11:49):
of the internal bleeding that she had.
The x-rays came back and showed thatthere was nothing that they could
see as per the x-ray of her abdomen.
So they told us what they wouldnow need to do is they need to
schedule her for another scan.
Which with the doctors thatwe were consulting, they said
could potentially lead towardsan internal bleed in children.
(12:10):
That's called a Mele bleed.
So they wanted to do a Mele test,which is another scan, but specifically
trying to find this Mele, which.
In essences in the digestive tract.
I think in the small intestinethere's like a deviation and they
explain that this deviation issomething that happens in it's rare.
It doesn't happen often, especiallyif there's symptoms from the actual
(12:35):
deviation in the small intestine.
It's really extremely rare.
This potentially could be whatthe cause of the bleed is.
So they wanna try to do the scansto try to see if that would happen.
But the scan couldn't happen on a Sunday.
It would only be able to happen onthe Monday when everybody was back
full staff compliment, whatever else.
So we're like, okay.
And obviously she's notcritical 'cause she's stable.
(12:56):
Although now we could startseeing in the bloods that her
hemoglobin levels were low.
So I think they were dropping, so theywere getting into the low nineties
on the weekend and by the Mondaymorning they were already in the
mid eighties and they were dropping.
So there was definitely a bleed andshe was definitely losing blood, which
is what was getting them concerned.
Hence, we were booked into the hospitaland hence they were trying to do the
(13:18):
test as a process of elimination to trywork out where the speed was coming from.
So the x-rays had come back negativeand they weren't showing anything.
The viruses come back negative.
So we were worried although.
My daughter still seemed okay.
Besides the ear ache, that was the biggestproblem that she was really having was
wa was the ear ache was still amazing,although she looked pale and she still
(13:39):
had the diarrhea and it still was darkin color and everything like that.
So we were in the hospital being mywife stayed in hospital with her.
I can tell you in star shop inthe Children's Hospital, they.
They give you a room for my daughter,and there's a bed there for my wife, so
my wife could actually stay with her.
And then what I was ending up doingis, because I've also got my son, is
(14:01):
I would travel home, look after him,get him all sorted out, travel back
to the hospital, everything all day,get them what they needed, then travel
back and forth and back and forth.
So that started obviously on theSunday and then again on the Monday.
I did speak to, to workextremely accommodating.
They were unbelievable.
They, to the point where actually mymanagers turned around and said, Brett.
'cause I was trying to juggle, Iwas trying to also work and take
(14:23):
my laptop into the office intothe office, into the hospital.
So I was trying to work in between workingafter hours, trying to juggle it all.
They eventually said to me, Brett,family first you just leave it.
Work will be here.
We'll look after it.
Why I'm sharing this is it justshows you the culture here about
family and ping family first.
And maybe I'm blessed that I founda company that's like that, but my
(14:47):
wife's company was exactly the same.
So in our opinion and our experiencesis showing us that the QE culture
where they talk about pittingfamily first, they live it.
And they were really pushingboth of us just to take time
off and go focus on your family.
And there's even a type of leave that youcan put in that comes off your sick leave.
Four, looking after your children.
So seriously they supported me like youwill not believe, and they supported
(15:12):
my wife doing the exact same thing.
So I just wanted to share this sothat it highlights to you that is
one of the things we've found aboutbeing here in New Zealand that is an
absolute positive over and above somany other things that I'm gonna share
in this story that I'm sharing today.
So getting back to the story and thetimeline is now we are sitting on
obviously the weekend we, my wifespent it in hospital with my daughter.
(15:34):
We've done some of the tests already,x-rays, blood tests, but it's not
finding anything conclusive yet.
So the Monday morning I was back atthe hospital after sorting out my son
and everything like that with my wife.
We went for that Mekelscan Mekel scan again.
Not much to the scan.
It's kind of like a CT scan whereshe just had to lay there, lay still.
It just takes time.
(15:55):
I mean, it must have been half an hour,45 minutes of them scanning all around
her abdomen trying to look for this me.
Then taking her back up to.
Her room and waiting forthe results of that scan.
I think the hardest part is doingthe blood tests every so often.
So they were constantly pricking herfingers to try and get blood out to try
and test test and see where her hemoglobinlevels were and they were dropping.
(16:17):
So I understand why they had to dothe test, but my daughter did not
like those tests at all, and it'sheartbreaking when you have to watch.
Your daughter going through somethingand forcing her to go through something
when actually besides her ear ache,she felt okay according to her.
So we are putting her throughpain to try and help her.
And you try, explain that toa 5-year-old, why they have to
(16:38):
go through pain to get better.
It just doesn't comprehend in their mind.
So it, it was really achallenging time for.
Not to mention what was also verydifficult is we had to get an IV line up.
My daughter had a total panic attack,like breakdown in trying to get an IV up.
She just totally refused to thepoint where we eventually had to
get the doctors to give her a bitof a sedative just to calm her down.
(17:02):
And I had to physically, even on theaerator where she was a bit loopy
and whatever, still had to physicallyhold her, sit with the doctors and
everything, putting up the ivy line.
So extremely traumatictrying to get that done.
But you understand it'sfor the good of your child.
So you do it, but it's still very hard.
I mean, my wife just couldn't,she to walk out the room in tears,
seeing how we're forcing her andshe's screaming, just let me go.
(17:25):
Don't do this.
It, it's traumatic.
And I'm not trying toshare this to get you all.
You know, feeling sorry forme or anything like that.
I'm just trying to explain thesituation that we're going through,
but more to explain how the nurses andthe doctors and the play therapists,
they were all there with us.
I must have had about nine people inthe room with me helping me, trying to
help my daughter blowing bubbles andtrying to distract her and whatever else.
(17:46):
So they were phenomenal andtrying to help us even, although
it was as traumatic as it was.
So that was on the Monday when wewere trying to get the MEKEL scan.
They said post the medical scan results,which we got back, I think it was late
on the Monday night, they came back andsaid, okay, well X-rays are negative.
Mekel scan is also not found anything.
They're not finding anything in thebloods yet They can point to anything.
So what they're gonna trynow on the Tuesday is they
(18:07):
were gonna try an ultrasound.
So Tuesday morning, again, stillgoing through her, staying in the
hospital with my wife going through.
Constant monitoring and testingeven throughout the night.
So now my wife's gettingvery little sleep.
My daughter's not getting the bestsleep either because they have to
wake her up every so many hours tocheck all her vitals and whatever
else as they do in the hospital.
So it's all normal.
Just showing that you're gettingsleep deprived now as well.
(18:29):
I was also driving back and forthbetween CBD, which we're about an
hour north, so back and forth tolook after my son and everything,
and going back into the hospitalevery day, taking him what they need.
So Tuesday we were booked infor the ultrasound, got the
ultrasound down on the Tuesday.
Again, more finger pricks,constantly checking the blood,
which my daughter was hating.
That said, after about the fourthone, she started getting very brave.
(18:53):
So really proud of her.
But we started learning what to doand how to distract her and what
worked for her and what didn't.
So not something you ever wannahave to learn with your child, but.
We learned how to get the fingerpricks done in a less traumatic way.
Still not something that she enjoyed.
But anyway, got the ultrasoundsdone on the Tuesday.
(19:13):
Those results, unfortunately,also came back as negative.
They couldn't findanything on the ultrasound.
This is where we were startingto get a little worried because
now we had a team of doctors.
We didn't only have.
Surgical doctors assigned now becausethey were thinking potentially
there may be surgery that they'dhave to do to really find what the
cause of this internal bleed was.
They had a gee me in medical terms, butthere's a gastroenterologist or whatever.
(19:40):
It's a doctor that specialized isin the digestive system, so the
everything to do with the smallintestine the large intestine.
The internal digestive system.
Okay.
So we had that doctor that was assignedas well as a number of other specialists
and they were all consulting andtrying to work out what was wrong.
And they were very good in the waythat they constantly collaborated and
(20:02):
they were constantly trying to do aprocess of elimination, but they were
also trying to follow a process wherewe would stick to whatever was least
invasive to my daughter and cause her.
The last resort was to have todo any type of surgery, which
scared the hell out of us.
So that's really whatwe were trying to avoid.
(20:23):
So we were really hoping some of thesetests would pick something up by the
Tuesday nights and slash the Wednesdaymorning when they were talking to us
and saying, okay, well they've donethe medical test, it's negative.
They've done the x-rays.
They've come back negative, they'vedone the ultrasound, it's come back
negative and not finding anything.
They've done a blood test checkfor viruses, bacterias, whatever.
It's come back negative and there'sstill obviously a bleed because her
(20:46):
hemoglobin levels were still dropping.
So they weren't in the seventiesyet, which would've been danger,
like really considered dangerous,but they were in the eighties.
So you could see her heart rate waselevated 'cause it was working a lot
harder to get the lesser blood around hersystem to get oxygen around her system.
So we knew that there, wehad to find that bleed.
We had to figure out where she wasbleeding to be able to stop her.
(21:10):
And so it's very stressful being in thehospital when, you know, your little
5-year-old, there's something wrong.
But even the doctors can'tpinpoint what the cause is.
And without knowing what thecause is, you can't fix it.
And that's, it's stressful as hell.
It really is.
So what they told us on theWednesday, the plan would be, is
the next step would be to book herin or to put her under general.
(21:32):
Aesthetic where we, they would do a scope.
So they would do anendoscope and a gastroscope.
So they're gonna put a scope fromthe bot from the top and a scope from
the bottom to try have a look andsee if they could see where potential
internal bleeding was happening.
The only issues with the scope from bothends is the scope from the top would
be able to take the hole right the waydown through the stomach into the small
(21:55):
intestine, but it could only go so far.
The small intestine is meters and meterslong and they wouldn't be able to go
through the whole small intestine.
So if it was further down intothe small intestine that we're
gonna be able to pick that up.
But the scope.
Going from the bottom end, it'll gothrough all the large intestine all the
way to the beginning, ah, sorry, the endof the small intestine where it joins
to the large intestine, but wouldn't beable to see the whole small intestine.
(22:17):
So if the scopes didn't pick up anything,the next step after the scope where
they'd have to do keyhole surgery.
So that's where they would put a camerain from making an incision above her.
Belly button.
And then they would have to physicallyuse a camera on the outside of the small
intestine so it's inside of her abdomen,but on checking from the outside of the
(22:38):
small intestine to see if they could seeanything wrong and almost trying to work
their way along the small intestine.
And what they would have to do isif they find, found the problem on
the small intestine, they would thenhave to make a further incision on,
on, on her abdomen from her bellybutton, or depending on where.
They found the problem on the smallintestine to pull out her intestine
(23:01):
for where the problem is and theywould have to cut that piece out
and then rejoin her intestine.
So as a parent trying to hear thisabout your 5-year-old that was
healthy just a few days ago towhere she had an ear infection.
To where we are at the stagesnow where they're considering
doing surgery on your child.
(23:22):
And taking her insides out anddoing major, like, major surgery.
This was one of the scariestthings I've had to go through,
and I promise you, it is one thingwhen stuff is happening to you.
I mean, I've had cancer in my lifeand whatever, in my own surgeries and
whatever, but it's so different when it'syour child and there are so many thoughts
that are going through your head and allyou want is the best for them, but you're
(23:45):
also so scared at the same time, you'relike so scared to make the wrong decision.
And you really want to just advocatefor them, but make the right decisions.
But sometimes you, it's so hard toknow what those right decisions are to
the point where when the doctors hadspoke, and my wife and I threw all of
this on the Wednesday and said they'regonna book her in for the Thursday.
Typical of my wife and I, we dida whole lot of research and I know
(24:07):
people say, don't consult Google.
Okay?
But we consulted Google.
I'm in it as well.
I could not help myself.
I promise you.
You can't sleep.
So all you're doing is between consulting,chat, GPT, Google, whatever you're trying
to do, as much homework as possibleto try and get an understanding of
what was going on inside my daughter.
And with all the feedback that yougot from all these doctors, you just
(24:28):
wanna see is there anything else?
And this is where you start seeing stuffabout, oh, well, there was this capsule
camera that they could use that could goall the way through her digestive system.
And there's a CT scan that they could do.
And you know, there's.
You wanna exhaust every singlenon-invasive surgery option before
you, you cut my little girl open.
(24:49):
That's kind of like what you weretrying to push to the point where
after doing this research I said tomy wife, right, we are meeting with
this doctor on Thursday morning andthis is my wife and I talking till who
knows what time in the morning on, onWednesday morning trying to go through
everything that we are finding online.
So I said, I'm gonna be thereearly on Thursday morning,
we're gonna talk to this doctor.
And no ways they've gottapush, they've gotta find this
(25:09):
without having to cut it open.
So I left early on the Thursday morning'cause they, they scheduled her for
this procedure, meaning the scope aswell as potentially if they can't find
anything of scope, then doing thiskeyhole surgery and potentially the
surgery to actually mend her intestine.
And we hadn't signed the.
The, what do you call it?
The non, not the non-disclosure.
(25:29):
What's the word I'm looking for?
See?
Oh, my mind.
But we didn't give permission, mywife and I to, to the surgery yet.
We, we hadn't agreed to it yet becausewe were still got so many questions going
through our mind and the doctors weregood, they understood where we were coming
from and said, well, give it the night.
Think on it and we'll talkfirst thing in the morning.
So I did meet with the doctors,specifically the surgical doctors
first thing in the morning.
I take a step back.
(25:50):
I know I met with him on the Thursdaymorning, but it was also on the Wednesday
when I was still at the hospital.
Before we had even done this researchin that night, one of the doctors did
come up 'cause we said we wanted totalk to the doctors 'cause we had more
questions and we weren't happy to sign.
And it was because the, in prep forthe surgery on the Thursday, on the
Wednesday, the anesthetist came to meetwith us and he was talking through his
(26:11):
plan of pain management, et cetera.
And he started then talking to how the.
Potentially if they went as far as to cutit open, whereas talking about epidurals
and whatever else for pain relief.
And that, I think is what that was like.
The penny drop for my wifeand I, what we are going that
far on my little 5-year-old.
And that's when we were like, no worries.
We need to see further doctors.
We have more questions.
(26:32):
We are not signing this, we not okaywith this, but it's so hard to say that
because at the same time, you also want,you don't want to make the wrong decision
that threatens her life, but at the sametime you're like, how can it be that?
She's gone from a few days ago.
Okay.
And even looking at her now, besidesher ear a and paleness, that it's this
urgent that they have to go to thatdegree to do this type of surgery.
(26:55):
It was just like so hard to accept.
So we explained to him no as, as greatas he was, and he really was good
when he speak to the surgical team.
Another doctor.
It.
They seen one of the surgical team,but she was one of the younger doctors,
and I don't mean it in a disrespectfulway, but she sat in front of me and was
trying to explain this to me and I'masking my questions, but she couldn't
(27:15):
answer some of my questions because,you know, I can be full of shit.
I know it.
Okay.
I really was, as a parent I wasalso lack of sleep, whatever.
It's my daughter.
I even started getting a little bit.
Full of nonsense where I turnedaround and said, you know, I
sent my car into a mechanic.
I probably asked the mechanicmore questions than what asking
you, and I'm trying to entrust mydaughter, nevermind my car with you.
(27:36):
Okay.
Then I would start and I sawshe was young and I knew I was
just being full of nonsense.
I turned around and said,well, do you have a child?
And I knew the answer wasprobably gonna be no, and it was.
So I said, well then you can'tunderstand where we are coming from.
And she tried to relate to, I was actuallybeing so full and nonsense and I know
that now, but I was really trying to.
It's like you are angry, soyou're trying to push for answers.
Anyway, why I was telling you that isshe had to go away and had to call one
(27:58):
of the more senior doctors to talk to us,and that's why on the Thursday morning I
said, okay, before my wife and I will meetwith the more senior surgeons and chat
to them and see what this was all about.
That was on the Thursday morning.
I got in and I really started.
Going for this doctor and turningaround saying, no, you, you haven't
tried all the non-surgical, youhaven't tried everything to the end.
What about this capsule that we've read,capsule scope that she could swallow and
(28:21):
go through and they said, ah, you can't.
She's five years old.
Too small.
I said, rubbish.
I read up online.
A two to a 3-year-old can.
She started explaining to me howit potentially won't be able to
pick up what we are looking for.
At that stage, we thought it was amekel that we were looking for and
it wouldn't be able to pick it up.
And I do know even reading onGoogle, it said for a mekel.
It's probably not gonna be able to pickit up, but it is something you could
(28:44):
just on, insist on and try to do furthernon-invasive scans from the capsule.
It also said you could try a properCT scan and I was pushing over.
But then what about a CT scan?
You know, you suddenlybecome this expert in.
Challenging the experts, you know,but you're really trying to do it.
Understand you're comingfrom a place of worry.
You're coming from a place oftrying to do right by your child.
So it's really hard.
And I was pushing her on the CT scan andshe would, she was explaining to me, oh
(29:06):
yeah, but in her size and what's goingon and the way the CT scan works, it's
not gonna be a, anyway, the long storyshort is you were really challenging her
on everything, but she was brilliant.
She was, she didn't dismissme, she didn't talk down to me.
She was assertive.
Which is what I needed.
She came across as, you know, sheknows what she's talking about to
the point I was even asking her, youknow, how experienced she is and how
(29:30):
many of these surgeries has she done.
And I've read up that Mele is so rare.
Have you even done a Mele ha experiencein dealing with a medical before?
So this is kind of, I wasreally going hard for her.
Okay.
Which I know probablywas quite disrespectful.
But it was really coming from aplace of worry for my daughter.
She handled it brilliantly.
(29:50):
She calmed us down.
She said, I asked her, okay, fine.
Talk through the wholeprocedure from beginning to end.
Tell me about your process of elimination.
Explain to me why wehave to go to this point.
And she spoke through it stepby step even, although I may, I
probably asked her to repeat herself.
I dunno how many times.
But I needed peace of mindand I needed to know that.
(30:10):
Okay.
We've done everything we can,we gotta go through with this.
To the point where even after thatdiscussion in the morning, she said,
tell you what, don't sign this.
Now.
We've gone through all the steps.
We've gone through all the why's.
She's reassured if this is whatshe would do for her child.
She's explained all the risksand everything of whether we do
it or we don't do it, and eventold us it's still our choice.
(30:32):
If we only wanna go up to the point ofthe non-invasive and we don't wanna do the
surgery and we wanna wait and see if ithappens again and then come back, fine.
It's still our choice.
It's not her recommendations though.
But she explained why with allthe pros, cons, risks, everything.
So she was really good and she evendidn't force us to sign anything.
Then she said to us, think we booked forthe surgery later this morning, rather
come downstairs and then you tell ushow far we need to or are allowed to go.
(30:57):
Hardest decisions of.
One of the hottest decisionsI've ever had to make in my life.
Okay?
Not only you sleep deprived, you'reemotionally at your wit's end.
My wife was emotionally at her wits end.
And here we've got this littlelife that is, she's so perfect.
And here we gotta make this decisionwhere we are giving people we've
(31:19):
just met the permission to, if theyhave to go all to all the way to the.
The position of cutting my daughteropen and pulling her insides out
of her body to try and help her.
I mean, it was freaking me out.
Anyway, we got to the point where wewent down, booking her into the surgery,
(31:40):
going downstairs and we got speak toanesthetist and the gastrologist or
whatever they called, and the othersurgical doctors and all the rest of it,
and we said, okay, we are gonna sign over.
We are gonna give thepermission for you to.
Not only do the scopes not only dothe ol surgery, but if you have to go
to the point of even cutting it open,putting out her anti test, fix her,
(32:00):
find the bleed, and let's get her sortedso that is the right decision by her.
Now, I promise you, signing that,that form and giving permission
for that, it took everything in me.
I've never felt so worried in all mylife in a decision that I've made.
Generally, I am.
I know what I want.
(32:21):
I know what decision I'm gonnamake and I just go for it.
And I stick by and I knew thiswas the right thing, but I
was still as scared as shit.
I promise you.
I was so worried.
And that's on the Thursday morning.
I think it was actually past morning now.
'cause now we had been delayingby talking with all the doctors.
So we were close to midday,somewhere around there, midday,
(32:42):
one o'clock that they said, okay.
What have you agreed to?
And we said, we've agreed to it all.
We've signed it all off.
That's when the anesthetistgave us something to calm it
down, put her to started puttingher to sleep, whatever else.
All the other nurses, doctorswere coming by and we were gonna
wheel her off as my wife was goinginto the surgical rooms with her.
'cause only one parent could go in.
(33:03):
I got to sit down in the waitingroom and just said, I promise
you, I balled my eyes out.
It was.
I was trying to stay strong in frontof them, but it was so hard trying
to tell these doctors that You'vegot my daughter's life in your hands.
Please look after my baby girl.
Just look after her.
It was hard.
It was so hard.
And then God forbid ifanything went wrong.
(33:24):
I swear.
I don't know if I'dever be able to forgive.
So it was one of the hardestdecision, and I'm sure so many
parents have had to go through that.
I pray no parent ever has to go throughanything surgical with any of their
kids, especially when they're so small.
It's awful.
But anyway, the wheel are off.
I was in literally a puddlecrying in the corner giving.
(33:45):
Thought, just let it out.
She gives a crap.
Just cry, get it out and waitfor your wife to come out.
So I waited for my wife to come outand join me and that's when they
ex they explained to us, okay, youcan go to the waiting room, go get
something to eat, walk around, whatever.
'cause they did explain her surgerycould, depending on how far it had
to go, could be as long as three, alittle bit more than three hours long.
So we knew it was probablygonna be the longest three
(34:07):
hours of our lives waiting for.
It's where we got to,did we even find this?
And what was scaring me even more is ifwe've signed all this off, they'd done
all of this, they cut it open, theylook, and then they still can't find
the bleed, which scared me even more.
So I dunno.
Which I wanted, you know?
Well, actually I do.
I know what I wanted.
I wanted them to go in with the scopes,find the bleed, and didn't have to
(34:28):
do anything invasive surgery wise.
That's really what I wanted.
But I, because of everythingthat was going on, I'd almost.
Resigned to the fact that I don'tthink they're gonna find that.
I think they're gonna go allthe way to where they're going
to do surgery and they're goingto have to cut my door to open.
And we're trying to mentallyprepare for that and the recovery
and everything afterwards.
(34:49):
And that's where we weretrying to get ourselves to.
So while she was in surgery, my wife andI said, okay, let's just, we've got three
hours, so let's just try walk around.
We, we hadn't eaten since, I don'tknow, probably more than 24 hours now.
'cause when they started.
Prepping for the surgery,she couldn't eat.
And because it's a endoscope anda gastroscope they give her stuff
(35:11):
to clear out the digestive system.
So she wasn't able to eatand when she wasn't able, you
can't eat in front of her.
So we didn't eat in front of her.
And actually you didn'teven feel like eating.
So we hadn't eaten in a while and we,okay, let's just go get some food.
So we walked off.
And me also having celiac disease totry to find somewhere where you could
even buy food was a mission, but.
You kid we're just trying to walkoff to try and get something to eat.
We bought some, I think it wassushi or something that we found
(35:33):
that was gluten-free or whatever.
So we bought the sushi and we were goingto sit in an area where we could eat
and that's when my wife's phone rang.
And I promise your heart probablysinks and full think Jesus, it's only
been an hour while the hell over thephoning is what the hell's wrong.
Okay.
And that all these thoughtsare going through her head.
And I just saw my wife stopcrying and she's on the phone
because they gave her number.
Anyway.
What it turned out is the surgeonhad walked out of the surgery
(35:55):
to phone us, to let us know.
As they put in the scope, theyfound the bleed in her stomach.
I cannot tell you what a sense ofrelief that was, because what that
meant is they've now found the bleed.
We know what the cause is.
So this tar like poops that shewas getting that was full of blood
is, it's actually called a Molina.
Okay.
It's called Molina.
(36:15):
That's what my daughterhad, and it also meant that.
Because they found thisbleed in her stomach.
It's not a mele, so it's not a deviationof her small intestine, which didn't
need the surgery or anything like that.
It actually turned out thatit was an ulcer on in her
stomach that was the bleed.
So they're able to stop the bleed sothat the, this, the bleeding would stop
(36:35):
and then Mog globin would stop dropping.
They were able to just check the,from the scopes from the topping and
the bottom end that this was the onlybleed and that the whole surgical
team and everything was confident.
This is what the cause was.
Or the actual root causes, we had tosee what caused the actual ulcer and
what caused the bleed in the beginning.
That turns out it's a combination offrom the ear infection and all the
viruses that she's been having, she'sbeen having flus and everything over
(36:58):
the last few weeks bringing back fromschool and then us giving ibuprofen
and the antibiotic that she wenton, and potentially a bacteria that.
When the lining of the stomachgets broken down because of all
the medications and the viruses andeverything that she's had anywhere.
Long story short, it was a amalgamationof a whole lot of things that
eventually caused this ulcer, andthat's what caused the bleeding.
(37:19):
It's just so coincidental thatit all happened when we put her
on this antibiotic, but I guessthat's why all of this stuff
all came together for the worst.
It's like the perfect storm to causethis ulcer and bleed in her stomach.
But the good thing was this doctorhad been, and this is just another
point I'm trying to make, she.
She cared enough about our mentalwellbeing and knew how important it was
(37:40):
to us and how worried we were that shewalked out of the surgery to pick up her
phone, to phone us personally, to tellus, we don't have to do the surgery.
We don't have to go that far.
We found it with the scopes.
We are not going to be searched.
Cutting your door open, whichshe knew was our biggest worry.
So she didn't make us wait untilshe had got out of the surgery.
An hour or more later, she toldus straight away she actually
(38:02):
had, she cared enough about ourmental wellbeing as well to.
Take the time to make that call tous, which meant the world to us.
That meant we could sort ofbreathe and know that, hey, we
were just going back to recovery.
We just stop eating whatever we're eating.
Just get to recovery andgo see my daughter, okay?
(38:22):
And know that we've atleast found this bleed.
Now we can start treating it and gettingoutta here and on the road to recovery.
So that was on the Thursday afternoon.
She finally came out of recovery.
They spoke to us and explainedthe amalgamation of the perfect
storm that caused this ulcer andhow the bleeding has stopped now.
How are we gonna have to go onmedication for the next two months,
which will help that improve how wecan't give her ibuprofen et cetera and
(38:45):
how are we going treat this over thenext couple of months and everything
to get on to the road, to recovery.
But we're at least in the stage wherewe found what the issue is so we could
actually now start getting her better.
Which was relief in itself.
They did explain because her hemoglobinlevels had dropped as low as they had,
they recommended an iron infusion,which we gave them the go ahead for.
So they gave her an iron infusion justto try and help boost her system so that
(39:07):
she could start getting onto recovery.
It did mean she would have to stayin that Thursday night as well and
keep monitoring her, and only whenwe see that everything's on the road
to recovery, then we can dischargeher and actually bring her home.
Unfortunately on that Thursdayevening, she started running a fever
where it started spiking to 38.5or whatever, right up to 39 point.
(39:28):
Six or whatever it was, and wasstarting to get really dangerously high.
They said you can get a feverpost having an iron infusion.
That's one possibility.
The other possibility is she's beenin the hospital for about a week
and there is a lot of sick kids,so maybe she's picked up a virus.
She was already sick anyway with herear infection and stuff like that.
Maybe it could be an infection fromthe actual scopes that had gone in.
(39:48):
So now we have to do a process ofelimination, trying to work out well,
what is causing the fever to go away.
Although we found the bleed andwe've got the bleed under control
now we've got a fever to dealwith, which was a pain in the butt.
All we really wanted to do was getout of there now and get home and
know that she's getting better.
So that was on a Friday andmonitoring it all the time.
Unfortunately, getting fever everyfew hours and trying to manage it as
best we can with just paracetamol.
(40:11):
'cause you can't give anything elsebecause that'll compromise the bleed
in the stomach and whatever else.
So that was tough in itself.
Trying to get through theFriday and the Friday night.
On the Saturday is when theyeventually said to us, okay.
She's still got the fevers, but allthe tests we've done, 'cause they did
further blood tests, there's, we can'tpick up any of the other viruses.
We can't pick up COVID, we can't pickup any other bacterial infections.
(40:32):
So it potentially just because of theiron infusion that she's getting, the
fevers where we've just gotta keepmonitoring her and hopefully it'll break.
They wanted to keep her the Saturdaynight again until the Sunday and
only discharge her on the Sunday.
But, and that's a podcast for another day.
What we've also been in the process ofdoing is my sister-in-law passed away last
(40:53):
year and we are in the process of adoptingmy nephew and he's still in South Africa
and we're trying to get him adopted so wecan legally be his guardian so we can get
him to come join us here in New Zealand.
He's staying with another family.
There's no other fam, it's another family.
It's friends that he'sstaying with at the moment.
That are looking after him andthey're a godsend, but there's
(41:13):
no other family to adopt him inSouth Africa and look after him.
So that's why we'retrying to get him here.
But it's been 18 months, it'sbeen a slog with lawyers and back
and forth and all kinds of stuff.
And we finally got a virtual call on whatis our Saturday night, which is their
Saturday morning with the magistrate andthe lawyers and everything to hopefully
get this adoption over the line.
So we really needed to be hometo be able to do that as well.
(41:37):
We did explain this to the.
The doctors as well as the socialworkers, and they even sent somebody,
it was a shrink to talk to my wifebecause they were worried about
her, but she unpacked and explainedeverything that we're going through.
They were so helpful, andthey went out of the way.
They said, look, if you're still inthe hospital on a Saturday night, when
you have to meet with the magistrate,we'll even get you a boardroom
booked with internet connectivity.
(41:58):
So you can make sure you can dothat and still proceed with the
adoption that you're trying to do,even if you're sitting in the hall.
Hospital, it's just another waythat they were so willing to go over
and beyond to be able to help us.
So it was unbelievablehow they would help us.
So we were pushing to try gethome by Saturday night so that
we could do that online meetingwith the magistrate from home.
(42:18):
But we didn't understand that, thatwe had to stay in the hospital.
We at least had a plan B, and we coulddo that just talking about the support
that we had over and above the hospitalstaff, the nurses, the social workers,
the play therapists, the doctors, the.
The psychiatrist, every, therewere so many people that were
willing to help from the hospital.
Over and above that we had mydaughter's teacher that was
unbelievable with a class.
(42:39):
She got all my, my, my daughter'slittle friends to write little notes to
her and drew little pictures for her.
They bought her gifts and toys andto play with in the hospital, and
they got a chocolates and sweetssand all kinds of stuff, and they
put it in a box and they got it.
Couri it over to the hospital.
So she got to open it up at thehospital while she was there and her
stay, that was earlier on in the week.
(43:00):
So they were phenomenal with that.
Some of her other little friends',moms and dads put stuff together
put voice notes, video notes fromtheir kids, sent it off to us.
Sent other packages, carepackages to our house that I could
take through to the hospital.
They were unbelievable.
We had friends that we've just made.
It's actually people thatmy wife works with that.
They were unbelievable.
Not only the care packs and everythingthey put together, but they were willing
(43:22):
to come and look after my son here.
They were willing to driveto the hospital and help us.
They, people went out oftheir way to support us.
So the community has been phenomenal.
And why I'm telling you this as well isI've always said that my wife and I, it
was just tag team and it's us alone here.
But I think this was a bit ofan eye-opener, not only on how
amazing public hospitals are.
(43:46):
I don't think we got the service wewere getting in a public hospital and
the care that we were getting fromour daughter in private hospitals back
in South Africa, and I know maybe wehad a bad experience with the private
hospitals back in South Africa, but itjust blew my mind that this is a public
hospital and this is the service thatwe were getting and all the care that
we were getting, which was phenomenal.
I didn't even mention that therewere therapy dogs that came through,
(44:08):
so there's even people that comethrough and she got to, to hug and
play with little dogs and whatever.
It was amazing.
It was really amazing.
And this is a public cost.
So that is like huge, why I'm sograteful to be in this country.
But over and above that, the community,the teachers and the other friends and
whatever, that would reach out and beso willing to help us was, it's amazing.
It's, it just it's blown my mindhow so many people genuinely
(44:30):
care and wanna help and that's,the support has been phenomenal.
Absolutely phenomenal.
Anyway, get back to the story.
So that was on a Saturday.
'cause now we had to get back forthis meeting with the magistrate and
the lawyers and everything like that.
They did allow us to just chargeher and we did get to bring her home
on the Saturday night and we gotto have the call and whatever else.
We were still having the fevers.
But what they had arranged then isthey said they'll arrange for a nurse
(44:51):
to contact us on the Sunday, andif there were any issues, the nurse
would even come through to our houseand if need be, would take her back
to the hospital and whatever else.
So I'm sitting on Sunday.
Now it's Sunday afternoonthat I'm recording this.
Yeah, we've had a bit of a rough night.
She still had fevers, but we'venoticed over today the fever seems to
be under control, so she's actuallyheading in the right direction.
So we are finally getting to actuallybreathe and move in the right direction.
(45:14):
My wife is still off for the rest of thisweek and will still be looking after my
daughter, but why I want to share this isjust for those people that are thinking
about moving to New Zealand or you'rehere in New Zealand and you sometimes got
second sec. Second guessing your decisionto either move or that you've moved here.
This has proved to me that we've madethe right decision for our family.
You know, I know back in South AfricaI need to make sure we always had
(45:36):
enough money to have private medicaland whatever else, but here this is the
kind of healthcare system and peoplecomplain about the healthcare system here.
But I'm telling you, the experiencewe've had at Starship now in CBD Auckland
has been phenomenal with my daughter.
The doctors have been great.
The nurses have been phenomenal.
They've really been good.
The support in the communityhas been phenomenal.
(45:58):
Throughout an experience that hasbeen an experience I don't want any
parent to ever have to experience,and I'm sure other parents have been
experienced worse than what we have,
but having experienced it here,I'm grateful to be in this country
and for the support that we've had.
So it's just another big tick for mewhy New Zealand is a phenomenal country
and we are grateful for this opportunityto call this home and to be here.
(46:22):
So I really wanted to share this just to,with the whole purpose of Soft Landing is
trying to help other immigrants make NewZealand home share my experience to show
you that the community is there, they canhelp you, sometimes you don't realize it,
and don't have, don't be like me and haveto go through this to realize that you've
actually got a support structure and a c.
That'll help you, but it's alsoputting yourself out there and
(46:43):
getting involved with them.
But it is just to show you, there is acommunity, there is a support structure,
and the health system here does work.
Big thing, if you're inAuckland, don't waste time.
If you've got something wrong with yourchild, go straight through to Starship.
Don't even waste your time.
Just go straight there to the emergency.
They've got everything you need.
Even if you have to wait, be patient.
Don't be like me and get antsyafter a couple of hours and want
to leave because it could bethe worst decision ever because.
(47:06):
This actually proved that my daughterwas worse than what we actually realized.
So rather stay and getthe okay from the doctors.
But yeah been a rough week,but it's also taught me a lot.
Not only has it been the scariest timefor me with my daughter, but it's also
given me a lot of hope and a lot ofjust made me feel how grateful I am to
(47:26):
be in this country and grateful for thecommunity that we have that supported us.
And just also amazed at how wellmy wife has done, you know, she's.
Fricking super trooper, I swear.
Yeah, she's been emotional.
Yeah, she's been cryinga bit, rightfully so.
But she, you know, she, it just provedshe'll do anything for her kids and
goes out of her way and we can pulltogether and get through anything.
Okay.
Please don't challengeus with anything more.
We had enough challenges for now.
(47:47):
Please.
Side note, I didn't tellyou about the adoption.
I know it's another podcast foranother day, but we, it got signed off.
So the magistrate has grantedus as legal guardians.
My, my nephew will be herehopefully in the next month or so.
So, another big tick, big thing off ourshoulders and I'll do a podcast about
that another day, but just, it's been arough week, but we've made it through it.
We're still grinding on and we'llkeep going and we'll never give up.
(48:10):
But I just wanted to share with youguys, so if you've got queries about
the healthcare system here or you've.
You, you're having yourchallenges and hard time.
Also, if it can just inspire youto never give up, just keep going.
You know, you can get through it.
You have got a community that'll help you.
Just reach out.
Don't say no to the help.
If somebody's offeringyou, don't be too proud.
(48:31):
Just say yes, you know, we willalways the people back home,
that would help everyone else.
I'm always too proud to ask for help.
But one thing we've done hereis, you know, you just have to
sometimes just ask for that help.
And let them just give it to you.
You'll return it and pay it forward.
In weeks, months, years to come.
Just do the same for others.
With that, guys, I just wanted to, yeah.
Thank you for listening to my podcast.
I hope this resonated with some of youand would help in some sort of way.
(48:53):
And if it does, please share itwith others so that we can help
as many immigrants as possible.
Just settle in New Zealand.
The whole idea is to make New Zealandhome, help us as immigrants to pull
together, share our experiences,share what works, what doesn't,
and help us make this home.
So please share it with as manyother immigrants as possible and
follow and like my page, please.
(49:15):
Or not only just like, subscribe to myYouTube channel, it's at soft landing nz.
And let me know, you know, if there'sanything else you want me to share
or anything else that would help youguys reach out to me, let me know.
And yeah, I'll do a podcast on it ordo videos on it or reach out to other
people that can try and help with that.
Guys, just stay safe, stay strong.
(49:35):
And speak to you soon.
Keep up chat.
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
CrimeLess: Hillbilly Heist
It’s 1996 in rural North Carolina, and an oddball crew makes history when they pull off America’s third largest cash heist. But it’s all downhill from there. Join host Johnny Knoxville as he unspools a wild and woolly tale about a group of regular ‘ol folks who risked it all for a chance at a better life. CrimeLess: Hillbilly Heist answers the question: what would you do with 17.3 million dollars? The answer includes diamond rings, mansions, velvet Elvis paintings, plus a run for the border, murder-for-hire-plots, and FBI busts.