A “rollercoaster of emotions’’ is how Katy Taylor-Hamilton’s family described their feelings following her heart transplant at the weekend.

The 20-year-old, from St Bees, is making “excellent progress’’ following surgery on Saturday afternoon.

Her mum Emma-Jane Taylor said: “We would like to thank everyone who has sent us never-ending messages of support. Being away from home, people will never know how much that contact has meant to us.’’

Katy, who is a popular member of Popsteps, Hensingham Day Centre and St Bees Priory, is recovering so well that she was dancing in her bed just 24 hours after her surgery.

Emma-Jane said: “By 8pm she recognised her dad’s voice and signed that she wanted a drink. She couldn’t speak due to the ventilator. And by 5pm on Sunday she was strong enough to ask to play Pharrell Williams on her phone.’’

Katy, who has Down’s syndrome, had slight heart failure when she was 18 months old as a result of the chemotherapy drugs she had taken to battle leukaemia. However, despite taking medication for her heart over the past 18 years, she has remained active and healthy.

Emma-Jane said: “When she became ill in September it was a complete shock.’’

Katy had developed a chest infection and was sent from the WCH to the cardiac centre at Newcastle’s Freeman Hospital. Tests revealed she had congestive heart failure, and her heart medication was reassessed.

In October, medical staff told Katy, Emma-Jane and dad Geoff Hamilton that she would probably require a transplant at a future date. On December 9, Katy was “blue-lighted” by ambulance from the WCH to Newcastle following a deterioration in her condition and fluid overload.

The urgency of her condition meant she was placed on an “active list’’ for those needing a heart transplant, and given supporting drugs to help her heart.

Over the festive period, a very poorly Katy was in the ICU at the Freeman having dialysis and the removal of an overload of fluid from her organs.

Emma-Jane said: “I never gave up hope. I kept thinking she would be okay. On Saturday at 6am we were told there was a possibility of a heart for Katy.

“When we told her she cried, but she said they were ‘happy tears’.’’

By noon that day she was undergoing surgery, and seven hours later was back on the intensive care ward.

Without the new heart, Katy would have needed to stay on the ward until a suitable donor was found – which could have taken months and in some cases years.

For the next fortnight, she will need to be recovery seeing only her parents. This will be followed by several weeks of appointments, with them living in a nearby flat. It could be around six weeks until Katy and Emma-Jane return home to St Bees.

“We have had a lot of support, which has been fabulous. Katy is very sociable and misses her friends,’’ said Emma-Jane. “Katy was too ill to open most of her presents, so we are going to have Christmas when we come home.’’