A cancer survivor continues with her pregnancy despite knowing that her daughter was going to be born with half a heart

Larissa Brown, a 39-year-old woman from Townsville, Queensland, has never given up in her life. at age 27 she was diagnosed with breast cancer from which he came forward and has achieved being a mother of two girls despite suffering from endometriosis, a disorder and ailment in the uterus.

The treatment used to combat the two diseases made it very difficult for Larissa to have children, but Larissa Brown managed to be the mother of a girl named Emilia in 2017. She got pregnant again in 2021 and doctors alerted her at 20 weeks’ gestation that her future daughter (Georgia) was suffering from hypoplastic left heart syndrome, a rare and complex defect that affects regular blood flow. That news received terribly by Larissa.

“It was not in our hearts to terminate the pregnancy”

“It was pure anguish. I took a week off work and just cried“, explains Larissa in statements collected by Daily Mail. But Larissa did not give up and continued with her pregnancy despite this terrible news.

“It was not in our hearts to terminate the pregnancy, and we felt like the worst people in the world for choosing to continue, but we couldn’t give it up,” Larissa Brown acknowledges.

In order for Georgia to survive, Larissa and her partner, Nathan Brown, decided to move from Townsville to Brisbane to be close to the Queensland Children’s Hospital, a hospital center where they could help Larissa in the delicate moment of giving birth.

At 38 weeks, doctors decided to perform a caesarean section for Larissa. At that time, time was running against them, since after giving birth to the baby they had a short space of time, between 30 and 60 minutes, to supply Georgia with a specific medicine. That prevented Larissa and Olivia from being able to interact like any mother with her newborn baby.

With only six days to live, Georgia underwent open heart surgery, which lasted 10 hours. The recovery was long and the little girl suffered a collapsed lung.

“It looked very swollen and it was bad, but then he started to recover wonderfully, then out of nowhere he needed more oxygen. The doctors had no idea what was wrong with him, they did all the tests and gave him medication, but gradually he got worse,” explains Larissa.

But finally the cardiologist managed to figure out what was happening to Georgia’s heart: He had excessive circulation and his oxygen levels were dangerously low. Two days later, doctors underwent another surgery on the little girl. After 169 days in the hospital, little Georgia was able to leave the hospital and go home with her mother.

“I was both terrified and excited, because at the hospital, if we were worried about something, we could ring the bell and a nurse would come. Now it’s up to me,” admits Larissa.

Fortunately, little Georgia has been progressing and is about to turn a year old. Her mother could not be more proud: “She is an incredible baby and always dazzles everyone.”

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