On 7th April 2021, Harper-Lily Booth came into my life and made me the happiest I had been for a long time but that happiness was short lived (about 5 minutes to be exact) before we noticed Harper turning blue, within an instant she was whisked away from us.

To add context to this story, exactly a year before (in the same delivery room, in the same hospital) Jordan birthed our first child, Autumn-Lily Booth who was birthed early due to complications and who we knew would never get to see grow up.

Due to the complications of our first pregnancy we was on intense monitoring at Manchester Children’s Hospital with Harper and again at the 12 week scan we are told ‘there’s a problem’ the same words we heard just months before and it broke us, as time passed we where told of all the different complications that could potentially happen (some of which are too horrific to even share).

Despite all the noise, no one knew exactly what was up with her, all we knew was she had a set back jaw.

Fast forward back to her day of birth, we had around 7/8 nurses and doctors on standby but they had all left following her arrival as initial signs where fine. 5 minutes later she is rushed to the intensive care unit and diagnosed with a cleft palate.

In the days and weeks following Harper was cared for at Bolton Hospital with the help of CLAPA who helped us find our answer of why? Pierre Robbin Sequence!

Because of the hole in her mouth we had to learn how to feed Harper through a tube while in intensive care.

The worse part about this being the fact that at 10pm we would have to leave Harper and go home until the next day.

With the help of CLAPA Harper has now had her mouth surgery (to close the roof of her mouth) and has been involved with speech and hearing therapy and is now just like any normal 3 year old little girl, you genuinely wouldn’t know!

Because of the help of CLAPA and to achieve some of my own personal goals, I am going to involved in a Charity Boxing Match in November.

If you know me, I have never really been a fighter or the initiator of conflict but I really want to test myself.

Becoming a Father has taken a toll on my physical and mental health but now my Family is in a good position, it’s time to take time out and challenge myself. I have some check points along the way which I will be posting updates of.

The end goal, Win the fight. Just like my little girl did!