Shelley Hoyland's Story

"I lived to raise my kids!"

The last thing Shelley Hoyland expected after the birth of her second son was heart failure.

Following a difficult pregnancy, Shelley’s first son, Keoni, arrived five weeks early by emergency Caesarean section.

“Just to hear him laugh was the most precious thing in the world! He was a good healthy baby until he was about six months old,” Shelley says. “The paediatrician noticed his groin pulses were weak. It turned out he had a constriction in the major blood vessels in his leg. He had surgery at eight months old to fix the problem and patch a hole in his heart.”

After Keoni’s surgery at The Prince Charles Hospital, they returned to as normal a life as possible with a young baby. Now five, Keoni still has trouble with his heart valves, but otherwise is a healthy kid. Just 14 months after Keoni was born, Shelley was back in labour, this time with Zackia coming a week early.

“It’s funny, both times we were taking grandma out for the day and the baby came early!” Shelley says. “I said to her ‘I think I’m having contractions’.”

Rushing to hospital, Shelley was getting no relief between contractions. The doctors discovered her uterus had ruptured and she was in real danger, needing another emergency Caesarean.

“Jeremy was working that day and he only just made it to the hospital in time. Mum was prepped to come in for the surgery in case he didn’t make it.”

Three days after the birth, Shelley woke with rattling breathing. She felt like she needed to constantly clear her throat. She was transferred to the Holy Spirit Northside, the private hospital located on The Prince Charles Hospital campus.

Shelley says, “Basically, my heart got stressed out after having the baby and I was diagnosed with a condition called peri-partum cardiomyopathy. The doctors were already talking to the transplant unit at The Prince Charles.”

Shelley was referred to the Advanced Heart Failure and Cardiac Transplantation Unit, the state heart transplant centre.

“While I was in Intensive Care, the nurses were worried I’d develop mastitis because I wasn’t able to breastfeed. They would bring me cabbage leaves from the kitchen,” she says. “Being in hospital and seeing my parents watching me, knowing they just wanted to be able to do something to help was awful.”

The next few months were spent in and out of hospital, taking different medications to manage the heart failure. Shelley was allowed to go home once she’d had a pacemaker fitted.

Just before Zackia was born, Jeremy had started a new handyman business and was trying to get established. Shelley’s parents took time off work to help look after her and the two babies.

“I used to work at a day care centre. Mum worked there too, in the babies’ area. Zackia was in day care at six weeks old, with Mum there to keep an eye on him,” Shelley says. “I’d go in to be with him. The girls brought in a futon and that’s where I’d sleep during the day. He was such a serious baby. It was horrible leaving him behind when I was transferred to the other hospital.”

After months of treatment, Shelley was still getting worse. She didn’t have the energy to walk more than a few metres and couldn’t eat more than a mouthful of corn each day. She would sit on the couch doubled over in pain.

“The doctors told me the drugs would make me sick, but I wanted to make it work. I could see what it was doing to my family. Jeremy rang the hospital and told them what was happening. I came in and was listed for transplant. It all happened so quickly.”

In the lead up to the transplant, Shelley was taken off beta blockers. About a week before the transplant, she phoned the hospital and thanked the doctors for helping her.

“I said I felt fine and didn’t need the transplant anymore,” she says. “They explained to me that my heart was basically getting flogged, it was working so hard I was running on adrenaline. They still have a joke with me about that.”

Shelley received her heart transplant in December 2006, five months after Zackia was born. Eight weeks after the transplant, Jeremy didn’t want her stay home alone. She would go to work with him during the day while he was renovating a house.

“The transplant nurse rang me to see how I was going and I told her I was sanding. I just felt like a new person! I had a new lease on life.”

To reduce the chance of her body rejecting the new heart, Shelley, now 35, will be on immune suppressant drugs for the rest of her life. She can’t return to the childcare industry, but she and Jeremy have discovered they love working together.

“When we’re at work, he’s the boss. That’s fine with me as long as he remembers that once we walk through the door at home, it’s the other way around!”

While she was recovering from her transplant, Shelley would carefully play with Keoni as he was learning to walk. She’d walk behind him, slowly chasing him around the table.

“Just to hear him laugh was the most precious thing in the world!”