Her parents, Laura and Huw, tell her story
“We first knew something was not right with Eva when she refused to feed at approximately 6am on the Saturday morning. She had been unsettled overnight, crying a lot more often than seemed normal for Eva, and only content to sleep in one of our arms. This was enough for us to start worrying she wasn’t herself.
After she stopped showing an interest in feeding she went to sleep for a long time, and we were relieved because we thought she had tired herself out from all her crying. Three hours later she was still sleeping and was difficult to wake up.”
Our concerns grew
“On waking up she was crying but did not sound like her normal self. The cry was weak, and high pitched. Our concerns grew.
We phoned the GP and took her in to be assessed. Later on in the afternoon, when the GP had sent us home and we were changing her nappy, we saw that her skin had turned extremely pale and mottled on her legs.
This was when we knew something was seriously wrong and we went straight to A and E.”
This happened over the course of 12 hours. It happened so quickly.
“We knew that something serious was wrong but could not comprehend that it would be fatal. It was so difficult to see all of the doctors and nurses appear out of nowhere in A and E to try and revive her.”
All you want to do as parents is look after your baby, but we couldn’t do anything to help her
“During that week in hospital we clung to every tiny piece of good news, hoping that we would see her improve. When we were told to prepare ourselves for the worst we knew our darling girl was not going to pull through."
She fought so hard
“She fought so hard but was just too small to be able to cope with the severity of the infection she was fighting.
Our whole lives were turned upside down for the second time in a month. We had to make the heartbreaking decision to let Eva go to sleep forever, and she did so in our arms.
In the days following we set up a forever fund with a target of £1,000. We never imagined that over £12,000 would be raised in such a short space of time.
Eva has touched so many people’s lives, and we take such strength in knowing that the money raised in her memory will help to spread the word about meningitis and Strep B.
Our love for our precious little girl will never leave us, and will drive us to keep fundraising to prevent this devastation from happening to other families.
Meningitis Now has been extremely supportive. They have been able to help us pull through a very difficult few months by reassuring us we do not need to be on our own. They have been able to help us to cover the cost of Eva’s funeral, as well as set aside money in a grant for a memorial when we decide what to do. We have attended a family support day, where we met other parents who have had similar experiences and they have been able to provide counselling.
For the future, ultimately, we hope that there is a vaccine developed to prevent Strep B infections in newborn babies, which can go on to cause meningitis.”
