The family of a Skerries girl who had two thirds of her windpipe removed are raising funds to make her home more accessible.
Molly Grant was only four when she had surgery to have two thirds of her windpipe removed. And while she was able to function fine for twenty years, now Molly is having difficulty because her windpipe has “gone more narrow than it ever was”, and causes her breathing difficulties with regular trips to ICU.
Molly, who has Down Syndrome, has been rushed to the hospital three times this year - first with a chest infection on New Year’s Eve, then with pneumonia and sepsis in March, and again with pneumonia in the end of May. She remains in critical condition.
Molly’s sister Emma has organised a fundraiser to try and help their mother with the costs of travel to the hospital and to make Molly’s home a more accessible place for her. The family want to make a downstairs bathroom and a bedroom, as Molly isn’t strong enough for the stairs. Emma said: “When Molly is [going] down the stairs, that’s when her oxygen is dropping.”
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Doctors are currently waiting to see if they can do a trachea dilation, but at the moment she’s not stable enough to get it done. Emma said: “This is going to be ongoing. They said that each time she gets sick, it's going to shorten her life.
"There’s only three plans. There's either to do a dilation every month, a stent or a major operation, but she won't last through a major operation and the stent isn't doable.”
Doctors need Molly to be stable enough for a few months in order to do a surgery. Emma said: “She keeps ending up in ICU. They need her to be well enough that she won't end up in ICU to be able to do a surgery that big. All they're doing at the minute is keeping her on the ventilator to try and stabilise her breathing, because her oxygen keeps dropping.”
This situation has been immensely difficult for Molly’s family. Molly’s twin sister Tara, who also has Down Syndrome, couldn’t handle seeing her after the first time she visited.
Emma said: “She can’t handle seeing her in the bed, not being able to get up and with the tubes and stuff. She’s finding it really hard.
“We're trying to find support for her as well to be able to cope with it because she has Down Syndrome as well and she doesn't really understand what's going on, she only has her day centre.”
The day centre that Molly attends has paid for a private Occupational Therapist, who has recommended to Fingal County Council that the family home needs extension to get an accessible bathroom and bedroom. However, Emma thinks it would be months before permission is accepted and work is completed.
You can find Molly's GoFundMe page here.
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