A message from a grateful father.

Thanks for visiting my page. I am fundraising for the Alder Hey Children’s Hospital; a magnificent service that I sincerely hope you will never have to use yourself.

Back in April 2019,before she was even born, my little princess was diagnosed with a congenital heart condition: Tetralogy of Fallot. The condition is not actually one heart defect but four, affecting all four chambers of her little heart. I’m sure you can imagine how difficult this news was for our family but after consultation with Alder Hey, the decision was made that she would require open heart surgery either at birth or within 9 months of her arrival. 

Isabella was born safely and after months of monitoring a date for her surgery was set: April 2020, just as the pandemic was shaking the NHS and society itself to the core.

We were scared, to say the least, but surgery day came and thanks to the skills of the hospital staff, it was a success.

This in itself is a terrific reason to fundraise for Alder Hey (doesn’t get much better than saving your daughter’s life during a pandemic) but I have more reasons I’d like to share that I’m guessing you may not be aware of. Because the system that saved her life is of course made up of the extraordinary people to work within that system.

When your child is poorly and in danger, parents can feel lost and desperate: not just during the surgery itself but in the resulting appointments for after-care that results. The feelings of fear,
helplessness and yes- anger- bubble away while you try to hold it together for the rest of the family. The staff at Alder Hey, from doctors and nurses to receptionists, cleaners and admin staff, supported us not just with Isabella’s physical well-being but our emotional
well-being as well. Their professionalism was matched only by their kindness and helpfulness in what was an extremely difficult situation for us.

I find it difficult to put into words on how thankful and grateful I am to the staff of Alder Hey, which is why I decided to take a practical approach and raise some money for a hospital we are extremely lucky to have. The work they do is undervalued and I hope that my
efforts will highlight to the public that if ever they were unfortunate enough to require the extraordinary services of Alder Hey Children’s Hospital, the hospital will be there to help. Even in the middle of a world-wide pandemic.

I truly hope that no family that goes through what we did but I know with all my heart that if you ever do, you will receive the same brilliance of care, humanity and medical treatment as we did.

Thank you for reading this and I do hope you can spare some cash for this asset to the North West.