Aimee was born 23rd July weighing 6lbs 6oz.  At 5 days old Aimee was rushed to hospital thinking that she was dehydrated. Once there, The drs wanted to run some tests, one of those tests was a lumbar puncture.

Soon after the test was carrried out everything happened quickly. Aimee was rushed to the high dependancy unit where I got told she had meningitis and the next 24 hours would be critical. I got to told to say goodbye as she had just a 5% chance of survival.

Aimee fought hard for the next 4 weeks. Whilst on hospital they explained that the meningitis was a type called group b strep, I had never heard of such a thing. They explained that Group b strep is carried in women in pregnancy. I blamed myself for a long time thinking I had passed this illness onto Aimee.

When Aimee was 10 days old, she had an ultrasound brain scan. Meningitis inflames the brain and so the lack of oxygen to the brain can cause it to become damaged. This is what happened with Aimee.

They couldn’t tell me what this meant for Aimee and that it would be a wait and see scenario. As Aimee grew, it became apparent that she wasn’t meeting her milestones like her peers was. That was when she got given the diagnosis of quadriplegic spastic cerebral palsy.

Aimee is wheelchair bound. She is unable to sit,stand, walk, talk and is independently tube fed. She is however a very happy little girl who makes everyone smile with her smile. 

Last year Aimee got her trike for her birthday and since then she has learnt to peddle her trike and can do it on her own which is a massive achievement. Which is why this year for her birthday we are doing a sponsored trike ride. Gbss has been a massive help in raising awareness of GBS as well as supporting me through those first few days of when Aimee was I’ll. I will be forever grateful for them.