Thank you for taking the time to visit Lance Bignell's JustGiving page.

On the 30th January 2018 we put to bed our gorgeous, happy, sturdy baby boy. He was almost 10 months old. Full of life and giggles, he had just learnt to wave and clap. That evening he played with his big brother Austin, watched 'In The Night Garden', had lots of cuddles, stories and plenty of  milk. He would usually wake during the night for a feed (or two), but on this night, he didn't cry and/or we didn't wake.

In the morning we woke to the beginning of a never ending nightmare. Our happy, healthy boy was floppy, completely unresponsive  and only just about breathing. Lance was rushed to Gloucester Hospital where they managed to keep him alive whilst waiting for a specialist mobile intensive care team known as WATCh (Wales and West Acute Transport for Children). WATCh worked for many hours to stabilise Lance before they transferred him to Bristol Children's Hospital later that day. He remained on life support but despite the best efforts from all involved, Lance suffered multiple organ failure and the next day sustained devastating swelling and injury to his brain. The awful news followed - there was nothing more they could do. 

We chose to have one final night with our beautiful boy. We stayed as close as we could on his bed, read him stories, sang songs, took some hand and foot prints and put my milk on his lips. The next morning on the 2nd February 2018 his very compassionate consultant returned and we held Lance in our arms as his life support was turned off. To this day, despite the pain, I cannot believe we had to say goodbye to the wonderful boy who had brought his whole family so much happiness. How on earth would we tell his amazing big brother.

Losing a child is often said to be a pain like no other. It is a never ending nightmare from which you can never wake up. The support we received from the hospital's Palliative Care and Bereavement team was incredible - I do not know what we would have done without them. Lance's postmortem took ten long months and finally concluded he died from Sepsis (a life-threatening reaction to infection), triggered by the beginnings of pneumonia that had not yet reared any symptoms. 

We want to give our thanks to all of the wonderful staff who cared for Lance and tried so hard to save him. We also want to give our thanks and support to the amazing bereavement team, who work with children and families facing the death of a child. We hope that by sharing Lance's story and continuing to fundraise, we can help to raise money for all the wonderful causes The Grand Appeal at Bristol Children's Hospital support. So far, your very generous donations have funded life saving equipment for WATCh and a great chunk of money for the palliative care and bereavement team. Both of these teams work across the whole of the West Country (and often beyond). The Grand Appeal provide vital funds for many more amazing causes just like these. Let's keep going.....

We thank you from the bottom of our hearts,

Caroline, Rich, Austin, Baby Lance and Fern xxxxxxx


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