Thomas B's quilt    (Quilt Completed)

Thank you

Thomas loves his quilt! He was so happy with it! It is stunning! He was so happy that people from all over the world helped make it! He went and put it on his bed straight away, and is now fast asleep with it! Thank you so much to everyone who helped make it, it is beautiful!

Finished photos

Individual squares

Fabric

Card

Stitched by: Heather Jepson

Biography

When Thomas was just 6 weeks old he was rushed into hospital, this was after being ill for a few days and I had been in touch with the GP and hospital a lot. I later found out they had written in his notes that I was a first time mum and was just nervous! However by the time he was rushed to hospital he was very ill and was basicly dying in my arms. It turned out he had Group B Strep Meningitis, a virus passed on to him by me when I gave birth to him. He spent 3 weeks in hospital and during that time his brain swelled. He lost his hearing and the baby I had known disappeared forever. Lucky his hearing returned, but he was left with glue ear and later diagnosed with a sensory disorder which made him extra sensitive to certain noises. Thomas was a very quiet baby. He failed to reach any milestones, he never crawled, infact he only ever bottom shuffled, but he didn't do this until he was over 2 years old. He was kept a close eye on, but I knew from as young as 6 months that things were not going to get better for Thomas. It was 2007 when he was having his review with his consultant that he agreed things weren't going as he thought and he told us he was pretty certain Thomas had autism. He referred him and when he was seen a few months later it took the doctor 5 minutes to diagnose him. The other conditions all came later, some within weeks, some months later. At the time I knew very little about autism, or how it would shaped our future.

Fast forward to today and we have a lovely 10 year old son. He is so funny and so sweet and so loving, we are so lucky, he has come so far. He didn't speak until he was 5 years old, he was in nappies until just last year. He attends a special needs school, but he is so clever, he has a photographic memory and is a great reader, he is so good at maths and can memorise maps, no need for sat navs in our house! Thanks to medication we can now get him to sleep, he doesn't sleep that much, but its so much better than it was. He does rule our house though!

He taught himself how to tell the time, now he is obsessed by it, things have to be done as and when he says and if it isn't he gets very stressed out and goes into full meltdown. He is getting bigger and stronger as he is heading towards the teenage years, he is already finding the changes to his body harder, especially as his mental age is no where near his actual age, it is a confusing time for anyone, yet along a boy with autism.

However, no matter what we will face in the future, I am certain that Thomas will remain the happy, loving, funny and cheeky boy he is today.