For The Love Of Lloyd | Supporting His Recovery

Lloyd had anything but an easy childhood, he didn’t speak until he was 5 years old and had some learning difficulties, He had speech and language and other therapies to help. He eventually overcame these hurdles and grew into a Loving, Caring, Friendly young man who would do anything for you, nothing was too much trouble.

Lloyd played many sports over the years and eventually dedicated himself to Tennis where he achieved a level 3 Tennis coach qualification with the Lawn Tennis Association and has created a great client base and friendship group. Lloyd is head coach at Hadleigh Lawn Tennis club and is a key player at The Deanes school sports centre where he coaches tennis and generally helps out with the sports program.

A few years ago, Lloyd had taken up boxing training for additional fitness alongside me, at the start of this year he had an opportunity to train for a charity white collar boxing event to be held in April 2023.

At the end of March a few weeks before the event, our family life would change forever. Lloyd was training to help prepare him for his match and he took a blow that knocked him out. Fortunately, there was a paramedic and an ex-paramedic that were also training at the gym that morning and they made the decision to take Lloyd to Southend Hospital A+E as an ambulance wasn't available.

I went to the hospital to be with Lloyd who presented himself at A+E with a sore head, nausea and in a state of confusion, they quickly were able to get him a CT Scan which showed that Lloyd had sustained a major bleed on the brain, I called our Mum & Dad to say they should come now as things didn't look good, within a short amount of time Lloyd began to deteriorate and needed to be put into an induced coma. From this point on, it was a race against time to get Lloyd to the Royal London hospital and to get him into major surgery to release the pressure from his brain caused by the blood clots. Lloyd had to have a part of his skull removed to take away part of the clot and make room for the brain to swell and save his life.

“We think we've saved his life” the surgeons said, but they could offer no guarantee that Lloyd would make it passed the next 24-72hrs.

Within 1 week of this accident occurring, Lloyd underwent 3 major surgeries and a few weeks later had to have a 4th operation as his wound wasn't healing due to multiple infections during this time.

He spent 4 weeks in the Intensive critical care Unit and 3 and 1/2 weeks in the High dependency unit before being transferred to the recently opened rehab unit at the Royal London Hospital which has a maximum 6 weeks stay and currently only 4 beds. Lloyd was referred to 3 specialist rehabilitation hospitals and has been lucky to be offered a bed at one on his last day.

He will likely spend the next 3 months under assessment and then we will only truly know what continued care and support he will require.

Lloyd is currently in a low awareness state but continues to fight and is making small improvements. Recovery from brain trauma injuries take time and intense rehabilitation. It is likely that Lloyd will need to relearn to talk, walk, eat and hopefully communicate with his family and friends again.                                                                  

We are fundraising for Lloyd as his injury is life changing and he will require some form of care/support for the rest of his life. Any donations will go towards helping and supporting Lloyd with his recovery and whatever he requires in the future.

Our fundraising goal may seem ambitious however we have been advised that Level 1 Private rehabilitation can cost in the region of £15,000 per week and other treatments that Lloyd may need in the future are also very costly. 

We appreciate times are hard and we will be very grateful for any donations and sharing to spread awareness will also be a great help.