It’s not just bricks & mortar... this has given us hope... it’s given the children back their dreams
DIY SOS helps family with sick kids
Their young lives blighted by rare illnesses that will worsen over time, the Sweet children had no big dreams for the future. Louisa, 16, Max, 13, and seven-year-old Harry will all one day become full-time wheelchair users and parents Cat and Chris worried how they would cope in their small house.
But a DIY SOS transformation has given them a fresh start – and new hope.
Cat says: “The house isn’t the big thing. It’s not just bricks and mortar.
“When you give a family like ours a home, it’s not just the security and a long-term environment.
“They’ve given us hope and given the children back their dreams.”
Harry has suffered since birth with Ehlers Danlos syndrome, which causes him so much pain in his joints that he struggles to sleep.
In 2017 genetic testing found Louisa and Max had Friedreich’s ataxia, a rare neurodegenerative condition.
Cat, a full-time carer for her kids, finds their birthdays particularly hard.
She says: “I hate because it’s one step nearer to a bad day. In that 12- month block there’s always something that’s been a deterioration. Even since these last birthdays, Lou’s walking is much worse, Max has developed arrhythmia, a dangerous rhythm in the it
a rt. Each b i r thday is another closer to a time when they won’t be able to manage so well.” Before the DIY SOS team stepped in, the family home in Weston- super- Mare,
Somerset, was too small and inaccessible for kids who will soon be in wheelchairs.
Cat, 35, said: “In six months’ time I’ve got three full-time wheelchair users in my house and my house is like this. I don’t know how that’s going to work. I can’t physically move my children any more. I’m scared that will happen before we’ve had the chance to do anything. We won’t have anywhere to live.”
But then DIY SOS and an army of selfless volunteers stepped in to help transhe form the home into an accessible haven.
Before the build Cat was having to lift her children in and out of the bath and carry them up the stairs. Now there is a wheelchair- friendly bathroom with hoists. The team also installed a lift and put hoists in the kids’ bedrooms to help them get in and out of bed. Cat says: “They fixed something for my children that I couldn’t fix myself.”
It was not until Louisa hit her teens that Chris and Cat realised something
I can’t tell you how much this has changed our lives
was wrong. Chris, 42, says:
“We’d noticed when she was younger she seemed a bit clumsy – just a bit of a klutz.
Then before her 13th birthday, everything normal stopped. The consultant said they were concerned about her because she wasn’t walking in an age-appropriate manner and her balance was quite poor.”
She was diagnosed with Friedreich’s ataxia, and soon after it was found Max had it too. Cat says: “This condition is killing them. There’s nothing I can do – no operation, no pills... One day I’ll wake up and one of them isn’t going to be here any more.” Heartbreakingly, Cat tells host Nick Knowles how Louisa once said she did not look to the future. She says: “I asked her if she had any dreams about travelling, a job... and she said, ‘I just don’t have any’. And that’s really sad.” But the transformation of their home made the family realise how loved they are by the community, and gave the children something to hope for.
Cat says: “There are still huge challenges they face, we’re in a real transitional period where things are deteriorating rapidly, and Louisa’s fear is she will lose her motor skills and not be able to draw any more.
“But now she says things to me like,
TEAM WORK Volunteers help transform the house
‘ Will I be able to push my baby’s pram?’ She’s thought that far in front, she wants a family.
“Max wants to go to university, Harry wants to be a policeman, Lou wants to work with animals. They all want to do things. I can’t tell you how much this has changed our lives.”
DIY SOS: The Big Build is on tonight BBC1, 8pm and on iPlayer
CAT SWEET ON DIY SOS HOME TRANSFORMATION