Many of you will know me, and my family. But for those that don’t my name is Holly Russell. I am married to James and together we have a little girl, Eva. I have one sister, my big sister, Sophie Spina.

On Valentine’s Day in 2019 Sophie told me she had been diagnosed with stage 4 follicular lymphoma. In that moment my world stopped and everything with colour became dull. When the pandemic hit in 2020 Sophie’s condition meant that she, like so many others with similar conditions, had to shield and so along with her husband, Tom, and their then 7-year-old son, Gabriel, she battened down the hatches. Little did we know how long that would be for, for those advised to shield. Thankfully, for the time being at least, Sophie’s lymphoma is ‘behaving itself’, though she remains under active surveillance to determine when her treatment will need to begin.

Once government restrictions were finally lifted and they felt safe enough to do so, the Spina family went on a much-needed family holiday to Cyprus in April this year. They were so excited, and I remember them sharing the loveliest picture of them waiting to board the aeroplane. Truth be told, I was apprehensive about them going - a lot of people were coming back from holidays abroad at that time with COVID and I worried about the implications of Sophie catching it as having lymphoma means she doesn’t have a very good immune system. But they regularly shared pictures to the family Whatsapp group and they were having the best time!

On April 9th my family and I had just driven back from seeing friends near London when my phone rang. Tom had been playing in the swimming pool with Gabriel and had had an accident. The hospital in Cyprus felt his injuries and associated complications were not survivable. He had sustained fractures to his neck which had in turn caused a spinal cord injury and compromised a main artery. He couldn’t move his arms or legs. Water from the swimming pool was already affecting his lung’s ability to work properly. He was transferred to a specialist hospital with neurosurgeons, the other side of Cyprus, who agreed to operate on Tom to try to save him but they warned their efforts may well be futile.

The longest 13 hours of our lives later, in the early hours of the morning, Sophie text to say he had survived surgery but was on a ventilator in intensive care, where he remained for several weeks. There were many times when we did not think we would ever see Tom again. Every time he was declared medically fit enough to be repatriated home, he developed sepsis or there were not enough suitably qualified flight crew to accompany him. Eventually however he was flown home to our local hospital where he spent another month in intensive care and then a further two months waiting for a rehabilitation bed at the National Spinal Injuries Centre at Stoke Mandeville. And now, 8 months after the accident, Tom is still at Stoke Mandeville, but preparations are finally underway for him to come home. If everything goes to plan, by the time Tom eventually comes home he will have been away from his friends and family for a year.

Everyone who knows Tom is missing him dearly and we cannot wait to get him home and for Tom, Sophie, and Gabriel to begin to adapt to their new normal. Life for them all will never be the same again.

Tom loves spending time with his family, socialising, cooking, being active, and his work. All these things are going to require huge adaptations, but we are determined to make this happen for him. We want his home to be accessible, as removed from a hospital environment as it can be and for him to lead as independent a life as possible. This will require the creation of an accessible driveway and wheelchair access to the front and rear of their house, a special profiling bed so that he does not need to have a hospital bed and a through floor lift so that he can access the upstairs of the house including the bathroom. These things are just the start and don’t include hidden costs that we cannot begin to anticipate and nor do they include other things that we will need to consider such as an accessible vehicle, an electric wheelchair as well as further rehabilitation and physiotherapy. We are becoming increasingly worried that the costs involved will prevent us from giving Tom, and his family, the life together that they so desperately deserve.

And so, with all of this in mind, we have decided to setup this page. Many people have contacted us to offer their help and support and to generously offer donations towards our efforts to give Tom the best welcome home and onward life possible. We will also use this page to keep you updated on several fundraising projects we are planning for next year and to enable people to sponsor those participating in events and activities in Tom’s name.

We will also use this page to provide detailed updates on Tom’s journey home to his family and friends.

If you are able to offer us any help or support in ways besides donating or attending/partaking in the fundraising events we are planning then please reach out and make contact with one of us – myself, James, Tom’s brothers Nick and Patrick or Tom’s friend Steve Burke would love to hear from you.