Alicia

Alicia Kerrie White was born on 29th September 2014 with a Heart Condition, which was life threatening. She had 2 days in the intensive care unit at Birmingham Children’s Hospital where she was monitored until she was ready for the 8 hour surgery. The surgery was successful and the team of surgeons and staff were simply amazing, they kept us updated at all times.

After a further 2 days she regrettably had a heart attack and lost her life for a while, but the team resuscitated her and she was put on life support. As you can imagine this was the single most heart breaking experience for all of my family. However, the staff at the Children’s Hospital were so supportive.

We were assigned a Support Worker called Ruth, who sat with us, prayed with us and attended to any issues or concerns we had.

Alicia was on life support for almost 5 weeks, where we got to know her, read to her, hold her hand and talk to her. She was a very funny little girl with a stubborn streak. Despite being prescribed drugs that helped her sleep, ensuring she could get the rest needed in order to get better, she still fought to stay awake.

During this time the hospital liaised with Great Ormond Street, along with hospitals in both Australia and America on her progress and how to proceed with her treatment.

On 5th November 2014 the hospital decided it was in Alicias best interest to try and take her off life support, regrettably she died in my daughters arms an hour later.

Even though Alicia passed away I will always be grateful for the 5 weeks she lived, where we got to know her and her personality, we have photos and memories which we will treasure. The 5 machines that she was on for most of her life cost almost £5000 a day to maintain, something that we are lucky to have on the NHS here in the UK.

I am now determined to continue to raise money for the hospital for as long as I can, so that I can repay my family’s gratitude.

Sharon Millar, Connect.

Theo

In July 2016 my wife and I were delighted to soon be parents. After a happy and healthy pregnancy, we were days, if not hours away from meeting our little baby. Unfortunately the unspoken fear for all parents was confirmed, and our baby boy died a matter of minutes before being born. This was mainly due to an acute event where his oxygen supply was cut off, but we later learned that the hospital failed to act on warning signs which may have saved our little boy.

We were completely devastated but wanted to attempt to do something positive for our beautiful boy, Theo and keep his memory alive. Over the past 2 years we have taken part in various events to raise money/awareness for charities supporting baby loss.

Hospitals and trusts such as Birmingham Children’s Hospital provide vital care, training and research supporting many causes. I’m proud to help support the amazing work they do and take part in the Wolf Run later this year with the rest of the Connect team. It should be great fun and lovely to do something positive in memory of my little boy.

Andy Swinburne, Connect.