Imagine writing a book and hosting motivational talks before you’ve turned 18.
A tough start
After Eva’s mum Kelly fell pregnant with her first child, she was delighted to be welcoming a baby girl into the world. However, when Kelly went into labour with Eva, things took a downhill spiral quickly. Kelly went into labour two weeks early and immediately felt that things weren’t right. When Kelly voiced concerns to the midwives and doctors she was ignored and felt that everyone was ‘just too busy to help’.
After two days of a stressful labour, Eva was born but was quickly taken away from Kelly and rushed into the neonatal unit. Kelly was alone in the hospital room, stressed and anxious and was left with little idea of what was happening and no reassurance that Eva was safe.
Throughout Kelly’s labour there had been a few things that raised concerns. Consultants had given her wrong information, a Midwife was missing and staff had been too busy to take Kelly into the ward to induce her and start Eva’s birth. Staff had not been monitoring Eva’s heartrate and hadn’t communicated to Kelly why Eva had to be put in an incubator.
Kelly had no choice but to return home and leave Eva in hospital. Even following the days after Eva’s birth, the family were left in the dark, having to call up the hospital constantly to check on Eva’s health and progress.
Kelly knew very quickly that something had gone wrong with Eva’s birth. Kelly had noted that Eva’s eyes were swollen, her hands were always curled over, and her posture was always curved. She cried a lot, barely slept and seemed agitated during feedings. Despite something not being quite right, doctors didn’t provide any sort of diagnosis for the family.
An investigation launches
After months of a mother’s intuition that something wasn’t right, Kelly got in touch with us. She felt Eva’s care had been neglected at birth, which prompted us to start an investigation. When Kelly and her husband received various documentation we had obtained from the hospital, the words ‘cerebral palsy’ were used throughout the documents, a diagnosis that had never been communicated to the family. When Kelly and the family finally had been given a diagnosis, she was angry and frustrated that she had been left in the dark for so long about it.
After Eva’s diagnosis, we signposted the family to cerebral palsy and child disability experts who could give them more information on Eva’s condition.
Before Kelly contacted us, she had no idea there were solicitors out there who dealt with these kinds of matters but was quickly reassured by us that they had a strong case. The cerebral palsy had been a result of a brain injury that Eva had suffered during her birth.
“Irwin Mitchell have been the backbone of our family throughout all of this” Kelly says. “They supported us with the right accommodation that made things more accessible for Eva. They just gave us things that made our lives and Eva’s life so much easier. They helped with everything.”
After we requested medical records and instructed independent medical legal experts, we worked hard to get Eva’s family the answers and support they deserved.
As a result of the compensation received from the settlement, we were able to appoint a support worker to help Eva with her day-to-day living. We were also able to provide suitable equipment to help Eva, including mobility assisting equipment as well as rehabilitation services including physiotherapy and occupational therapy. We also supported them in getting a larger property so Eva could have more of her therapies available at home to take some of the pressure off her family.
“Before Irwin Mitchell got involved, the information we had about Eva was so limited. We really had no idea what was happening, we knew Eva was progressing differently than other her babies her age but we had no support, other than one midwife, who had been the only person in hospital that told us that we needed to get some legal advice and speak to a solicitor,” said Kelly.
From adversity to inspiration
“The first time I noticed I was different was in primary school. When I was around 8, I noticed other children were writing, cutting things out and sticking things and I couldn’t quite keep up. Everyone in my class received an invite to a party apart from me and that was when I knew I was different to the other kids and really felt excluded” Eva says.
Eva struggled at school, she struggled to feel like she fit in and felt like she couldn’t always do the same things the other children could do. Eva said when she was young she was confused and couldn’t understand why she was being treated differently. “Cerebral palsy was something I knew I just lived with from a very young age, so I couldn’t understand why others treated me differently because of it” she said.
“Now I’m older, I don’t want my differences to have a negative impact on me. I want to use my experience to help others and make sure nobody ever goes through what I’ve been through. The effects I feel from cerebral palsy are more physical than anything else. I get tremors in my hands and physically I get a lot of pain, I struggle to walk long distances and just a lot of daily things that should be simple take a lot longer for me to do.”
Despite any setbacks, Eva doesn’t let anything stop her. Because of the help her family provides her and the legal support from us, Eva has things put in place now to help her with her daily tasks. She loves cooking, and now has an adapted kitchen to help her, there’s been a wet room installed in her home so she can shower independently.
While Eva has always valued her independence and moving forward, she’s no longer afraid to ask for help if she needs it and is now able to do things she thought she never would be able to do. Her difficult experience at school encouraged her to write her very own autobiography and she has spent a lot of her time giving motivational talks at local schools to raise awareness of disabilities and being kind.
Looking ahead to the future
Eva has shown no signs of slowing down in recent years, from starting college to recently passing her driving test, she’s a force to be reckoned with.
She has recently been enjoying studying health and social care at college and is going to university next year to study occupational therapy.
Eva has found that helping others has in turn, helped her deal with the difficult times in her life. Writing her book allowed her to get her feelings and emotions down on the page but she also wanted it to serve as inspiration for others that also might be going through hard times, who might even be struggling with some of the same things she’s been through.
“No matter what I do when I’m older, I just want to carry on helping others and this is how I see myself doing that” Eva said about her future.
When asked what advice she would give to others, she had some poignant words to say.
“People tend to change how they talk to those with a disability, people sometimes speak to me like I’m a baby. Everyone with a disability knows what it’s like to go through life being treated differently and sometimes that can be hard. My advice to people when you meet a disabled person is, don’t limit your expectation of them. We’re just as strong as everyone else and we’ve been through struggles, but I’ve done things that I didn’t think I could ever do and we’re capable of so much.”
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