Helen's page
Helen Stonebridge is raising money for Cleft Lip And Palate Association
Story
After 21 hours of labour, my daughter Naomi was finally born. Only, she would not feed at all and it was not immediately clear what was wrong. After being seen by a number of doctors, Naomi was identified as having a cleft palate. This came as quite a shock as there were no indication during the scans. Those first few days were very scary, she was moved to the neo-natal ward where she could be closely monitored and tube fed.
From that moment on the continuous support and assistance from CLAPA has been invaluable.
A cleft nurse travelled from Nottingham to see Naomi amazingly soon after she was born and we were offered a wealth of information regarding the condition and treatment and to our relief, a specialist Dr Brown's bottle which worked wonders for feeding.
The gift of this bottle from CLAPA felt like a literal life saver. We received a welcome pack containing two more bottles which helped so much as the bottles cost £10 EACH! So getting 3 from this charity was an amazing help! They’re also the only place in the whole country that stocks these bottles for us to buy more.
Once the hospital were happy with Naomi's milk intake she was sent home where we received regular visits from our cleft nurse, who would answer any questions and relieved any worries we had. She also made us aware of the local support group "Happy Faces".
Whilst the nurses were able to answer all our questions and concerns, the Happy Faces group was something else! Meeting other parents who had already been through or were currently going through the same struggles and worries really helped emotionally. Having that support network to talk to helped more than anything and the group is ran by volunteers with some funding from CLAPA. CLAPA also organise fun days out and Christmas parties as well so that kids can meet other kids with clefts and have a great time. They train volunteers to run groups, to be parent supporters and many other things. Their website is a wealth of knowledge on all thing to do with clefts and is very helpful.
Recently CLAPA’s funding from the government has been slashed which is a huge shame but hopefully we can help!
As many of you know I’m running the London Marathon and will be collecting donations for CLAPA, a charity that has been invaluable to me and many, many others....
Please, please, please sponsor me and help raise funds for this truly amazing charity!
From that moment on the continuous support and assistance from CLAPA has been invaluable.
A cleft nurse travelled from Nottingham to see Naomi amazingly soon after she was born and we were offered a wealth of information regarding the condition and treatment and to our relief, a specialist Dr Brown's bottle which worked wonders for feeding.
The gift of this bottle from CLAPA felt like a literal life saver. We received a welcome pack containing two more bottles which helped so much as the bottles cost £10 EACH! So getting 3 from this charity was an amazing help! They’re also the only place in the whole country that stocks these bottles for us to buy more.
Once the hospital were happy with Naomi's milk intake she was sent home where we received regular visits from our cleft nurse, who would answer any questions and relieved any worries we had. She also made us aware of the local support group "Happy Faces".
Whilst the nurses were able to answer all our questions and concerns, the Happy Faces group was something else! Meeting other parents who had already been through or were currently going through the same struggles and worries really helped emotionally. Having that support network to talk to helped more than anything and the group is ran by volunteers with some funding from CLAPA. CLAPA also organise fun days out and Christmas parties as well so that kids can meet other kids with clefts and have a great time. They train volunteers to run groups, to be parent supporters and many other things. Their website is a wealth of knowledge on all thing to do with clefts and is very helpful.
Recently CLAPA’s funding from the government has been slashed which is a huge shame but hopefully we can help!
As many of you know I’m running the London Marathon and will be collecting donations for CLAPA, a charity that has been invaluable to me and many, many others....
Please, please, please sponsor me and help raise funds for this truly amazing charity!