26/07/2025
King's Kid Teddy đ„°
Three-year-old Teddy is waiting for his third liver transplant in his short life.
As he waits for his transplant he will be heading to the British Transplant Games in Oxford next week, which of course is made possible by two families; one who agreed to organ donation, and another who agreed to tissue donation, as well as his mum Emma who shares their story, and who shared part of her liver with her beautiful son:
âTeddy was born on the 8th of February 2022 at a very little 5lb 3oz at our local hospital. We knew very quickly that something wasnât quite right, and after many tests and scans over the following few days the team felt he needed to be transferred as they couldnât understand how his jaundice level was trending downwards, but unfortunately his bilirubin was constantly raising.
He had his first transfer to Addenbrookeâs Hospital which was thankfully still local where he received his first of many blood transfusions. The next day they found at 6 days old that he had scarring of his liver, and very quickly it was decided that he needed to be transferred to Kingâs College in London which came as a huge shock.
We made the journey to Kingâs and that evening we had to give our tiny 6-day old baby boy a kiss goodnight and leave him to travel over 80 miles to get home to our eldest. We got all our bits together to go and be as close as we could to Teddy whilst trying to ensure that life was as normal as we could make it for our eldest boy who was about to turn 4 in a couple of days. Luckily my Mum was able to come along with us so we could stay together as a family, for that we are so grateful. Our stay in London ended up being over 5 months in total.
Once Teddy got to Kingâs, they again gave him more transfusions, blood tests, scans and he also had a biopsy at 9 days old to determine what was wrong with him. We received the results quickly and sat down with a Consultant and Dr who told us that Teddy had Neonatal Hemochromatosis. Iâll be honest itâs still all a little blurry, but we were told his INR which should be 1 was 2.8, and if it rose to 4 he would need a Liver Transplant, but they did explain that the Liver can regenerate so they would give him an exchange blood transfusion to give his liver a chance to repair itself.
Unfortunately for Teddy this wasnât the case and at exactly 3 weeks old Teddy was listed on the Super Urgent transplant list. As it was too close to Teddy being born, I was unable to donate any of my liver and Teddyâs Dad wasnât a suitable size match either.
There was a couple of offers but unfortunately none were viable so we waited 7 weeks and in Spring 2022 Teddy received the best gift he will ever receive, the Gift of Life from his superhero donor. We will always be forever grateful and thankful to them for making this courageous decision to donate their childâs organs đ©·
As Teddy was so tiny when he received his transplant the surgeons decided a mono segment would the best way for him, so after a long 11 hour wait, we got the call to go and see our boy in PICU. The difference in his colour was amazing and something Iâll never forget. As Teddy was so small the safest option meant he was left open after surgery. His recovery went fairly well, and the team explained that they would need to close Teddyâs abdomen with a Fascia (which is a layer of tissue between muscle and skin from another donor), but this needed to be blood type matched so we waited for a month or so for Teddy to receive his gift from a donor and their brave family.
We were discharged from Kingâs and made it back home with our two boys for the first time mid-Summer 2022.
Teddyâs first year was far from straight forward as he managed to somehow get most childhood illnesses due to his big brother starting school, but he really did so well throughout all of them until the following summer when he had a routine hospital appointment and had contracted Covid somehow.
Whilst there, with further blood tests, ultrasounds and CTâs we found out that Teddyâs liver wasnât working as it should and he had ascites building up again. He then had more tests at Kingâs including an MRI, where they thought Teddy had blocked his Portal Vein, so we had a stay in Kingâs to get his levels right with the aim of going home, taking a blood thinner to hopefully stop any more damage happening.
However Kingâs decided to re-list Teddy for another Liver Transplant in September 2023, I decided this time as I was able that Iâd like to donate part of my Liver to Teddy We went through all the tests and it was decided it could go ahead, and we were booked in for the start of November 2023. In between we did receive a call, but it was decided it wasnât suitable for Teddy.
Therefore, we went ahead with me donating to Teddy a few weeks later. It was a very emotional morning for us all, and knowing I couldnât walk my boy into theatre was so hard but also knowing in a couple of hours heâd be in the theatre next to me ready to receive part of my liver. After an extremely hard 15 hour wait my husband and Mum were able to see Teddy in PICU. I remember every time Iâd wake in ICU, I would ask how he was doing. Little did I know that Teddy decided to bleed for over 4 hours at the end of the surgery meaning he used the most blood in the UK on that day, and his surgeon slept in his office just in case Teddy needed to go back down to theatre again.
Thankfully, he did not, and I was able to be reunited with my baby boy after 4 long days. He was still ventilated at that point but recovering well. It was so good to just see him even if I couldnât give him the big squidge and kiss that I wanted too.
I was discharged and then managed to keep going and seeing him each day for little stints whilst allowing myself to recover also and spend some time with my big boy. My mum stayed with Teddy when he was stepped down to HDU and Rayâs and I would go in each day.
One day to our surprise I received a call from one of Teddyâs consultants asking when Iâd be in as the President of Malta was at the hospital and he wanted to meet myself and Teddy. Himself, his wife, and everyone who was with him was amazed with how well Teddy was recovering. Teddy continued to recover so well that we were able to be discharged and go home after just 3 weeks, which as you can imagine after our first 5-month long stay, we were all very surprised but super pleased at the same time.
It was amazing to see the difference in our boy as within 3 weeks he was bum shuffling around, and a few months later he was taking his first steps. And now we canât stop him. He spends most of the time playing football with his big brother đ
Sadly, in the summer of last year we found after a routine appointment and scan, as his bloods were still fairly normal, that Teddy had managed to block/close, rejected two of his veins, this time his Portal Veins and Inferior Vena Cava. They are still unsure how this has happened, unlike last time when they thought he had clotted his vein, it turned out that his liver had grown blocking his portal vein. They tried to reopen the veins in August, but this wasnât possible, so the decision was made to re-list Teddy for his third Liver transplant.
Teddy was made active on the list in December 2024. Unfortunately, he hasnât received any offers as yet, but we keep hoping his call will come very soon. We just continue to try and raise as much awareness that we can for organ donation.
In the meantime, we make sure we enjoy every moment we have with our brave boy, and we are especially looking forward to heading back for our second Transplant Games again this year. Itâs an amazing weekend for the whole family and we cannot wait đđâ
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