Becca’s journey – Living with Cerebral Palsy and her Baffin TRIO™
“Hello, my name is Rebecca White. I am 17 years old. I live with my Mum Audrey, my Dad Paul, Megan, my twin sister, my Newfoundland dogs Eva & Suri and my cat called Tink. It’s a busy house!
My sister and I were born very early at 29 weeks. We had a very traumatic start in our life. I weighed in at a very small 2lb 14oz and my sister 3lb 5oz. I am the oldest by one whole minute. My mum had an emergency caesarean section on the 11th hour of 11th November 2001, in the delivery room there was a lot of panic, and we were both rushed off to neonatal intensive care, and my mum was also very poorly. They diagnosed our condition very quickly; it was a condition called Twin to Twin transfusion where one baby takes nearly all the red blood cells, and the other is starved of them. We were both very poorly at birth, and we were known as the “Remembrance Day Babies”. You can imagine how small we were and all the wires, machines and tubes on us to keep us alive were immense; my sister suffered heart failure and two collapsed lungs but miraculously she has developed with no issues – she is awesome.
I suffered a lack of oxygen at birth so my brain is a little bit broken. As a result of this,
I have quadriplegic cerebral palsy. I am unable to walk or sit unaided and have some involuntary movements. What all this means is that I am as bright as a button in a body that doesn’t want to work for me.
My mum and dad have to fight and fundraise for pieces of equipment that will benefit my health and wellbeing. I need a lot of physio to maintain a healthy skeletal structure and to prevent many serious health conditions.
They discovered the Baffin TRIO™, an amazing piece of equipment. It is a supported chair which acts as a second spine conforming to my shape, at a touch of a button it can change me to standing or even lying down all without having to be hoisted to other pieces of equipment. I now have one piece of kit instead to 2 and when I go to standing I am like a transformer!
The health benefits of this equipment are amazing. It benefits my circulation, assists in lengthening the tendons in my legs as I can stand, however, many times that I want to.
I will have healthier organs from having the benefit of standing when I want to.
I received my Baffin TRIO™ just before Christmas. My mum did a big fundraiser with her work colleagues and they raised enough money to buy the chair. I am so happy I love my Baffin TRIO™.”
Rebecca White