Supporting families who have suffered the loss of a child or have a child living with medical complexities

Supporting families who have suffered the loss of a child or have a child living with medical complexities

Congratulations Jasper! We are so happy for Jasper, who is celebrating 1 year of being seizure free! For the families we support, celebrating key milestones is such an important part of their journey. Here is Jasper’s inspiring story, written by his courageous mum.
‘Jasper was born slightly early and was 4 weeks premature. His birth was traumatic to say the least but he was absolutely fine when he was born. At 5 months old, Jasper had his first seizure, I remember the day very well.
He then went on to have seizures more regularly from the age of 12 months. We were in and out of hospital a lot due to the seizures, until they finally diagnosed Jasper with epilepsy.
Once diagnosed, we finally started Jasper on some anticonvulsants. I would be lying if I said the medication worked straight away, but it didn’t. After coming to terms with this, I knew it was going to be a case of trial and error, combining the right cocktail of medicines to try and control his seizures.
Jasper has been in and out of hospital for the majority of his life. He’s been in the resuscitation room more times than I can remember due to prolonged seizures.
In March of 2020 Jasper had a seizure in the night no different to any other. We went off to the hospital and he had bounced back to his normal self by the morning. That same morning out of the blue Jasper started having another prolonged seizure. He was very poorly this time round and after a long day in hospital we were moved to Manchester Children’s Hospital, into intensive care. Jasper spent 10 days in intensive care and over 3 weeks in hospital overall.
This particular seizure has affected Jasper’s ability to walk, talk and eat (things that he could do before). We don’t know if Jasper will ever get these skills back, but what I do know is that he’s improving all the time which is very promising.
On the 2nd March 2021 Jasper was 1-year seizure free! This is the biggest and most amazing achievement for Jasper. I couldn’t be more proud of this boy. We hope that we can continue to control the epilepsy and he can continue with his recovery.
Thank you for reading our story’
We are so glad to be a part of Jasper’s story, congratulations Jasper, you are such an amazing inspiration and we hope to see you back at the Retreat soon!