He arrived at ER in a coma, and was initially diagnosed as brain dead. He survived and was in a coma for 4-5 wks. He had a brain stem injury and suffered a severe right dense hemiplegia, could not move and could not speak for six months, he had severe tissue damage to his legs and a right divergent squint.

Luckily Lewis was allowed to go to a childrens hospital that was in Liverpool called Alder Hey which has a head injury team of specialist therapists. Alder Hey was quite a distance from home and we fought for Lewis to stay. Even in a specialist childrens hospital they did not have a childrens head injury unit, therefore Lewis had to stay on a neurological ward, mainly consisting of Very damaged brain injured children from birth.

In January of this year Lewis left Alder Hey, he had made good improvement and was in a wheelchair but was beginning to regain slow slurred speech, he still had no use of his right hand, unfortunately Lewis is right handed.

Lewis had to go to a handicapped school called Moorfield. This was necessary as mainstream schools are not set up to provide the therapies that were still important.

Lewis is still currently at Moorfield, and e, he ven though the staff are wonderful Lewis is in a completely inappropriate environment. Even when Lewis started at Moorfield he was inside totally the same boy as before the accident, and found it hard to understand why he was in a school with very ill children with complex physical and learning problems.

18 months down the line Lewis continues to improve, he has a wonderful determination and sense of humour that has refused to be squashed against all the dreadful experiences that he has had to survive. Lewis is now walking with a splint, his speech has fully returned although it is still slow and tuneless, he still has little use of his right hand and suffers from intention tremors in his left which he finds quite frustrating. We hope in the early new year Lewis will begin a slow re-intergration into mainstream school and return to his correct peers, at the moment he lives a very confused life in two worlds and struggles daily to regain communication with the children that were good friends before his accident.

Lewis leaves a strong impression on every person and professional that he comes into contact with.

For Christmas this year father christmas is bringing Lewis an adult quad motorbike, and we will jolly well make sure that he can manage to ride it.

Services and resources in England for head injured children are in the main rather poor or non existent. We have had to fight for everything on Lewis' behalf. I myself hope to contribute to changing this by recently becoming a parent trustee of the childrens head injury trust charity. we are dedicated to spreading awareness of injured children and improving services wherever possible.

I wanted Lewis' story to be known as he is a very special child and our hero. I hope this story gives hope to parents who are at the very beginning of the extremely long road to recovery. As a mother and as a member of CHIT I would welcome any information, support, advice,research on re-education, therapies,anything that could help our charity and our children.

Christine Hargreaves
Mother