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 Kate and Robbie Fox
County representatives
We live in the small Riverside Town of Woodbridge in Suffolk. We have lived here for 15 years and until August 1998 we were a normal happy Family. Sam, our eldest daughter was 15 and twins Mark, and Laura, were 13.
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We had just returned from a hastily arranged French Holiday, which had turned out to be one of the happiest and most relaxing holidays that we have had. We were at home when we decided to go and play tennis, so Mark and Laura had gone to get ready.
Mark found Laura lying on her bed. We tried to revive her, and the Ambulance Paramedics worked relentlessly for what felt like hours, but they weren't able to bring her back.
Her death has had a devastating effect on the whole family and we are still trying to come to terms with the fact that she has gone.
Laura had always been very fit and healthy, finding physical sports came easy to her. From her first year at school she had won running races, in fact she had won the 100m and triple jump at her school sports day just the month before her death.
Parents bring up their children teaching them what is dangerous and what is safe. You never expect that your perfectly healthy child will simply lay on their bed and die for no apparent reason.
The initial post mortem could not establish the cause of death. After extensive tests lasting an agonising 5 weeks, the final
Coroner's verdict was "probably aspiration of vomit as the result of an epileptic fit".
For lots of reasons we were convinced that this could not be the case, but at the time our grief was such that we accepted it, as opposed to an "Open verdict". We had never heard of SDS, or the research being carried out at St
George's.
About 2 months after Laura's death we were approached to take part in research with St
George's, which resulted in our meeting with Professor McKenna. He confirmed that Laura almost certainly died as a result of Long QT Syndrome.
We were put in touch with CRY and the overwhelming sense of relief and comfort we took from finding people who understood, cannot be put into words. This was tinged with
sadness that there were so many other people suffering in the same way as our family. We don't know what we would have done without their support.
Our aim with CRY is to raise awareness of the conditions associated with SDS and provide parents with the option of having their children screened. In this way we may just be able to prevent one other family from suffering the interminable grief that we have felt at
losing a child.
Grand Charity
Auction fundraising event 17th July 2004, Martlesham, Suffolk
If you would like to contact one of our
Representatives or a Bereavement Supporter please call the CRY office at 01737 363222 or e-mail cry@c-r-y.org.uk
and we will put you in touch with someone who may be able to help
you.
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