Amie was estatic after becoming a mum for the first time. But then she started to feel ill and lost her eye-sight. Would Amie ever see her newborn baby girl again? Amie tells us her story of blinding love.


I looked down at my newborn baby daughter Maddison lying asleep in my arms.

I couldn’t believe that after nine months of pregnancy and seven hours of labour she was finally here.

“Haven’t we done well?” I remarked to my smiling fiancé Quinton, 31, who was sitting by my bedside in the hospital.

But all of a sudden my gorgeous baby started turning blue in front of my eyes.

Her flaxen skin turned an off-blue colour and it was clear that something was wrong.

It seemed like I had only held her in my arms for a second when she was bundled off by nurses and rushed into special care.

But luckily it turned out to be a false alarm.

“She has a mild infection,” said a doctor at the Watford General Hospital a couple of hours later.

“We’ve put her on a course of antibiotics and she should be as right as rain in a few days.”

After spending two days in hospital, I was allowed to take Maddison home.

Walking through the front door of the flat I shared with Quinton, I breathed a huge sigh of relief.

Nothing could go wrong now; my baby was home safe and well. 

I settled Maddison into her brand new cot and started unpacking her baby things.

I’d just put a load of washing on when I suddenly felt a sharp pain in my head, as if someone was twisting a knife.

I winced as the pain grew stronger.

I felt as if I’d just been hit by a ton of bricks.

I’d suffered from bad headaches in the past, but this excruciating throbbing was like nothing I’d ever experienced before.

Looking at the distress etched on my face, Quinton called an ambulance.

Paramedics came out to see me, but told me that it was just stress from having a baby and advised me to get some sleep.

But the next morning, my headache still hadn’t gone away.

I was in agony and could barely get out of bed, let alone look after a new born baby.

I called my all hours GP service and a doctor came to see me at home.

He told me that I had migraines and prescribed me some painkillers. 

“You’ve got a new born baby,” he said. “You’re stressed out.”

So I went to stay with my mum, Sam, 38, to ease the pressure.

“Just try to relax sweetheart,” Mum said gently.

“I’ll look after Maddison while you get some rest.”

But it was impossible to sleep while my head was thumping.

I curled up in bed and finally nodded off.

In the middle of the night I woke up screaming in pain.

“Mum!” I cried out, tears running down my cheeks.

I knew deep down that this pain was much more than a migraine.

So the next day I went to the maternity unit at the hospital to get checked over.

But the nurses thought that I was developing postnatal depression and put me in a side room under observation.

The next day, my mother in law, Sandra, 59, and Quinton came to visit me in hospital.

As we were chatting, I suddenly noticed that my vision was going blurry.

I couldn’t focus on anything; I felt as if I was drunk, even though I was stone cold sober.

Then it all went black.

I started fitting and had a seizure.

I fitted for five minutes, frothing at the mouth, my blood pressure soaring.

My heart stopped beating and doctors had to resuscitate me using defibrillators to apply sharp shocks to my heart.

They managed to bring me round but I continued to float in and out of consciousness.

I was completely blind – my eyesight had disappeared.

It was terrifying - although I could hear what was going on I couldn’t see anything – it was pitch black.

I was hooked up to a drip and given drugs to stop me fitting.

Doctors told Quinton to take Maddison home and to call my family.

“Prepare yourself for the worst,” doctors warned my mum Sam when she arrived at the hospital.

“It’s not looking good.”

My grandmother Lesley, 58, collected my precious baby from the hospital.

Lying in my hospital bed unable to see anything, I heard doctors telling my family that it was possible that I had a blood clot on my brain, although they weren’t completely sure what was wrong with me.

I was taken to Hemel Hempstead hospital for an emergency MRI brain scan.

As I lay in the ambulance surrounded by doctors, fear seemed to stab at my heart.

Would I ever see my beautiful daughter again? Would I be around to see her grow up?

After the scan, a doctor gently explained that I had swelling of the brain.

I was moved to the stroke unit at Watford General Hospital where I was put on medication for high blood pressure and fits.

A top neurologist from the Institute of Neurology, London, came to examine me.

“You’ve got PRES syndrome,” said the neurologist.

“It’s very rare and it can kill you – but we’ve caught it just in time.”

He told me that PRES syndrome is a rare condition that women can develop if they are suffering from eclampsia or pre-eclampsia or after childbirth.

It can cause swelling on the brain.

I was put on a different type of medication to try and lower my blood pressure and reduce swelling in my brain.

But my sight still hadn’t returned.

Doctors had saved my life, but they didn’t know if I would ever be able to see again.

The next morning, I woke up in hospital.

I blinked several times.

I could make out a blurry shape by my bedside, which looked strangely familiar.

It was Quinton - I could see!

My eyesight had returned – it was a miracle.

After tests, doctors told me that the new medication to lower my blood pressure had helped and the swelling on my brain had reduced.

I spent the next three weeks in hospital recovering.

I had similar symptoms to someone who had suffered a stroke, so I had rehabilitation as the right side of my body wasn’t coordinating properly.

As well as weekly blood tests, I took medication for the next couple of years to keep my blood pressure low and to stop me fitting.

At first I had difficulty sleeping and became paranoid that every time I had a headache my condition had returned.

But I threw myself into being a good mum to Maddison and as the days passed I slowly got back to normal.

Three years on, I’m now trying again for another baby with Quinton.

There’s always a worry at the back of my mind that I might develop PRES syndrome again.

Doctors have told me that that there’s a chance I could get it again, but as the condition is rare no-one is exactly sure what will happen.

But it’s a risk that I’m willing to take.

Having PRES has made me realise how lucky I am to still be alive and to see my beautiful daughter grow up.

Family is the most important thing to me in the world and I wouldn’t give that up for anything.