My stories are about 2 baby girls, one who was sadly taken from this world too early and another who is currently fighting so hard to stay with us. Thank you in advance for the time you are taking to read this.

On January 29th of this year, the beautiful, funny, loving Sienna (on the left), 2 year old daughter of my good friends Alex & Ritchie, died of what was believed to be meningococcal septicaemia, however 18 weeks later it was discovered this was not the case. Whilst waiting for results, Alex & Ritchie learnt a lot about meningitis and sepsis and feel there is not enough awareness about this virus and how quickly it can take over. They later found out Sienna had Group A Streptococcus which was very treatable with antibiotics had this have been picked up quickly when doctors attended, however as it went untreated this developed in to a rare case of pneumonia which sadly made Sienna very poorly, very quickly. As Group A Strep & Necrotising Bronchopneumonia are both very rare and this does not occur very often, there are no charities set up specifically for these diagnoses. Alex & Ritchie set up Sienna's Smile to raise awareness of and donate to different children's charities whom they feel they could help and are currently supporting the Meningitis Research Foundation.

And now, my great niece, Minnie (on the right) is 17 months old and was born with a heart condition called congenital heart block (rare for babies) meaning she needed a pacemaker to survive and so had major heart surgery at only 3 days old to have one fitted. 15 months on, things were going well and we couldn't believe how great she had responded to the surgery so started thinking she was out of the woods. However, on 5th May, Minnie took a turn for the worse and was rushed to Manchester Children's Hospital where we learnt her organs had started to fail due to her heart weakening over the last year. As her condition was too complex, Minnie was soon transferred to Alder Hey Children's Hospital where she was resident for 10 weeks and had numerous major surgeries including a new pacemaker fitted. It is now we have learnt she is suffering from pacemaker syndrome, a phenomenon where patients feel symptomatically worse after a pacemaker has been fitted and presents with progressively worse symptoms of congestive heart failure. The only way for Minnie to survive is to have a heart transplant meaning she has been put on an urgent donor list and this week been transferred to Great Ormond Street Hospital where she will stay until she has had the transplant, possibly waiting up to 12 months. With all of these hospital stays, Minnie's mum, Natasha, my 24 year old niece, has been staying in accomodation provided by The Ronald McDonald House Charities. Without this, she would have been stranded and unable to be at Minnie's side all this time and have her 6 year old son and Minnie's brother, Mark, come stay with them. I am extremely grateful for this charity and feel guilty for having overlooked it in the past, taking for granted the little charity boxes we see at the tills in all McDonald restaurants.

Please join me in helping both of these charities by donating to my cause.

Thank you all.

Char xx