A New Beginning After Spinal Injury

Hi my name is Helen, my husbands name is Steve and we've been together for 10 years, our son's name is Bobby and we live in Cornwall, UK.

In the early hours of 4th December 2023 at home Steve was dealing with a diabetic hypo (low blood sugar) at the same time as suffering from a sickness bug. Steve was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes in 2017 and since then had dealt with hypos himself countless times, sometimes during the night and had also successfully made it through sickness bugs before without incident. But this time he struggled to keep down the sweets he had just eaten to bring his blood sugar back up and was on his way back down the stairs to urgently get more when he fell down the very narrow steep stairs at our house from the top onto the hard floor at the bottom. Somehow this caused a catastrophic spinal cord injury leaving Steve instantly paralysed from the shoulders down. This kicked off 2 hours of complete terror for both of us before the ambulance arrived and the worst 4 months of our lives.

Steve was first taken to Treliske Hospital and quickly transferred by Ambulance to Derriford Hospital where he was given a tracheostomy and put on a ventilator to help him breathe. He spent 4 weeks in ICU until he was weaned off the ventilator and after 6 weeks in mid January transferred again to Salisbury Hospital Spinal Treatment Centre for rehab where he remains now.

It has now been almost 19 weeks since the accident and Steve has made good progress. He now has quite good sensation all over with some patchy areas and small movements all over his body. He has physio, Occupational Therapy and Hydrotherapy several times a week. Frustratingly with this type of injury nobody can say what recovery will be possible but we are told that the most part of recovery should happen within the first 6 months but can continue to improve for years and complete recovery at this stage is not possible. Currently Steve uses a powered wheelchair that he drives with his chin.

We remain hopeful that there is a lot more improvement to come but the hospital are preparing us for Steve coming home in a few months as a wheelchair user and for being a wheelchair user for the rest of his life. Throughout the whole process Steve has tried to stay positive despite living every day in his worst nightmare but it is hard and he has good days and bad days.

This has truly been the worst four months of our lives and it doesn't look like getting any easier any time soon. Bobby and I visit Steve every other weekend at the moment. Our home in Cornwall is a 4 hour journey from the hospital in Salisbury and we stay in hotels which has become very costly. We have had some help from family and some small contributions from charities to help with the costs so far. Bobby is 4 years old, he misses his Daddy and he doesn't really understand what's happened and why Daddy isn't like he used to be. Not being together for Christmas broke his heart, Father Christmas couldn't bring him what he truly wanted... his Daddy home with us, he still talks about this a lot. We will have our work cut out bringing the magic back next year but we will do it.

Now is the time when we need to start looking towards the future and rebuilding our lives. We need to move house before Steve can come home as our house is not suitable for a wheelchair user and cannot be adapted to make it so.

We are told we need a bungalow, a wet room, wide door frames, wheelchair accessible doors and spacious rooms with plenty of turning space so that Steve can enter and exit spaces without getting trapped. We need space for a hospital bed or other specialist spinal bed, a hoist and lots of other equipment. None of this is cheap or on a par with our little terraced house so here we are asking for help. Any money we make here will go towards being able to move house and gain the things we are told we need as well as all the usual space we need for a family home. If we find ourselves with more money than we need for these things any extra could go towards our Salisbury hotel bills and we would like some to put aside for private physio sessions after Steve is discharged.

The target is large, but frankly a drop in the ocean of what this will cost us. Please help if you can. At the same time we know some of our friends are struggling financially themselves. If you can't afford to give anything that is absolutely fine and we thank you for your support in whatever way you choose to give it.

Much Love from Steve, Helen & Bobby x x x