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On June 9th, 2013 Temperance aka 'Bob' or 'The Bobster' took part in the 5k Race for Kids at Battersea Park, to try to raise money for Hearts for Kids, a charity run in conjunction with the Great Ormond Street Hospital’s heart transplant team. Being only 2 feet tall this was quite a challenge for Bob who used her Mini Micro scooter to help her complete the distance.

Bob is now 5 years old which is big, so this year she's raising the bar and walking 5 miles on June 21st 2014 in her new walking boots, not just 5km  and no scooter in sight.  A really big challenge as she is still only 2 feet tall!

The charity helps fund essential research into prolonging the life expectancy of transplant children, as well as supporting transplant children taking part in the annual British Transplant Games. Bob's life was saved when she was just 8 months old when she had a successful heart transplant after contracting Kawasaki Disease which went undiagnosed until it damaged her own heart beyond repair.

This is Bob's story:

Temperance was born in Jan 2009, perfectly healthy no heart issues at all. In May 2009 when she was 4 months old, she became unwell. We were told it was just viral, but it just seemed to linger on and on.....

On the 17th of June 2009 I put Temperance down for her afternoon nap, after a few minutes I heard a scream, the type of scream that makes your blood run cold!

I discovered Temperance in her cot eyes rolled back limp and turning blue, snatching her up from the cot I ran down the stairs and out into the street, where I stepped out in front of a passing car and demanded a lift to the hospital.  As soon as I got into the car I commenced CPR, I genuinely thought she had an obstruction or something in her airway....you just can’t entertain the idea  your healthy 4 month old baby is having multiple heart attacks, that’s not possible!

When we arrived at A&E Temperance was showing no signs of life.... 40 mins later the medical crew had managed to regain a heart beat

They discovered she had contracted a virus called Kawasaki Disease which had caused so much damage to her coronary arteries that it was impossible for Temperance to sustain herself without the help of an ECMO (life support machine).

Temperance was then transferred to GOSH, placed into a coma and put onto life support machine. After 48 hrs we were told that Temperance had sustained brain damage due  to a lack of oxygen on her way to the hospital. This was a total body blow on top of everything else!

It was decided that until they could tell the exact extent of the brain damage, GOSH would treat her as if she had none and pull out all the stops to try and get her better, for this I will always remain eternally grateful. Temperance remained on life support for 6 weeks!

After managing to get Temperance off the life support machine with the aid of a large amount of drugs, she was placed on the transplant waiting list at GOSH

A few weeks later Temperance's health took a turn for the worse, she was placed on a device called a Berlin Heart, with the hope it could keep her alive long enough to receive a new heart. 4 days later the call came, a heart had become available, on the 29th August Temperance received her new heart.

It was a bumpy start....Temperance came out of her transplant on the ECMO machine, her new heart was not working, it didn't seem too happy to be in its new home and was not beating by itself.

1 week later on the life support, Temperance's new heart began to beat inside her chest.

4 weeks later we were taking our beautiful little girl home. We are now 3 and a half years into our transplant journey, Temperance shows absolutely no signs of brain damage. As an outsider looking in you would never know what she had been through and the diagnosis she was given, so to say that she is a Transplant success story would be a slight understatement xx

Please help support Hearts for Kids by sponsoring Temperance – any donations will be very gratefully received.

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