When The Block contestant Jade Joyce went to check on her daughter one night in 2015, her life fell apart.
Isla, then just 18 months old, was asleep in bed after another day of battling the health problems that had been with her since birth.
Jade and Daniel nearly lost their daughter, Isla, when she was just 18 months old.
(Image: Supplied)There had already been multiple visits to doctors and hospitals for Isla and a series of tests to try to find out what was behind her struggle, but when Jade looked in on her that night, things were worse than they had ever been.
“She was lifeless,’ remembers Jade, 34. “she looked like she wasn’t breathing… she was white, ghost-like and very clammy and wet. I just screamed out for Daniel.”
Rushing to help, Jade’s husband Daniel, 35, took one look at their daughter and knew there was no time to waste.
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In a frantic dash through on a dirt road shortcut to town, Isla’s condition grew worse, Jade says.
“About half way in to town she was turning blue and her eyes were rolling back into her head.
“I was thankful I did a very basic CPR course and first aid course a month prior because I would not have known what to do!”
Once in Port Pirie, doctors called for an emergency airlift to Adelaide’s Children’s Hospital where Isla was saved and eventually diagnosed with the rare chromosome disorder Trisomy 5p.
“For Daniel and I that first week was… I’ll put it out there, it was easy!”
(Image: Nine Network)It was a nightmare the South Australian farmers are never likely to forget, but it’s had one upside – as tough as renovating a house on The Block is, it’s going to be simple in comparison, Jade laughs.
“For Daniel and I that first week was… I’ll put it out there, it was easy!” she says.
“We said: ‘Oh my goodness this isn’t actually that bad! When you have had so much happen at home and things that go on, you just have to pick yourself up and keep going.”
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