As many, but not all, of you will know, at the end of May Jude was taken seriously ill with a type of anaemia. It was very sudden and he went downhill quickly.

Thankfully a switched-on GP sent him by ambulance to Poole and the amazing team at Poole Children's Unit worked all day to try to find out what was wrong with him. To sum up an incredibly complex and rare diagnosis: his immune system was destroying his red blood cells.

By the time they had established what the problem was, his veins were collapsing, making it incredibly difficult for them to get a line in to give him the blood transfusion that he desperately needed. As parents, we thought we were facing our worst possible nightmare. However, with unwavering determination, professionalism and calm, the team in Children's HDU eventually got a line into his groin. To cut a long, rollercoaster of a story short; after 3 blood transfusions, 10 days in hospital and countless blood tests and other appointments, Jude is now doing great. (See above photo taken last week!) It will be months before the doctors are able to fully understand the root cause of all this and tell us whether or not it's likely to happen again. Overall, the future looks promising and we're enjoying seeing our cheeky little monkey up to all his old tricks again and a whole lot of new ones too.

We feel lucky and thankful for so many reasons and want to take this opportunity to thank our families and friends who have offered us such amazing support in so many different ways. Please don't underestimate how much your kind words and prayers comforted us and helped us to stay positive at such a difficult time.

In particular, we were blown away by the care that Jude received in HDU and continues to receive on his regular visits to hospital. The doctors and nurses are so kind, they care so genuinely for the children and try so hard to make things fun if at all possible. They looked after Jude AND us with such patience, kindness and empathy. They even looked after our parents too at times! The night shift nurses made us feel like Jude was in safe hands, which meant that we could sometimes get some sleep, which in turn helped us to be better parents. If there was a way we could fundraise to give them all a payrise, we would!!

The Children's Unit will use this money for things like extra beds for parents to stay overnight, equipment like portable DVD players to keep children entertained, equipment for the parent's kitchen etc. These are things that don't get covered by the normal hospital funding, but make a real difference to the experience of families. Jude really benefitted from some of the amazing sensory equipment used by the Play Specialist to help to calm him and distract him from unpleasant procedures.

If you're not able to make it to one of our fundraising events, but would like to donate anyway, please use this page to do so.

Thanks so much in advance for your donations to such a special place.