Sadly, Helen has battled Chronic Lyme disease for over 10 years and has exhausted all avenues over the years with regards to treatments. She cannot get the medical assistance she so desperately needs in the UK.

As parents we are heartbroken that we cannot find any more money to help her get better treatment abroad. Our finances are shot we have spent every single penny trying to get our lovely girl fit and healthy again. Lyme disease has blighted our family and with two of us being affected it has cost hundreds of thousands in lost income and medical treatments and we do not know which way to turn now to give Helen a chance of having the normal life a girl of 20 deserves.

She struggles every single day and has joint and muscle pain, memory loss, confusion and worst of all her heart is now affected by the disease. We are so worried what will happen next..

Helen has had lyme since age 10 and has just turned 20. She has had to defer from University even though she tried so very hard to keep studying but she is completely debilitated by Lyme disease and day by day it is destroying her life.

She lost her childhood to Lyme Disease. While all her teenage friends were out living their young lives, Helen spent most of her time laying down on her own in a quiet room handling pain and fatigue. It is awful knowing that she is missing out on so many valuable times with her friends and to know she has now had to give up her studies, something that she so loved, we are watching her slowly withdraw from a normal life. She is determined one day to achieve her degree at University and we are absolute in our passion to help her achieve her goal. But we need to get her well first.

Watching our daughter being isolated away from normal life leaves us heartbroken and feeling guilty that we can't help her financially any more to fight this battle. The implications of her not getting treatment are unbearable for us as parents to think about. We are so worried for her future.

She is a brave, determined lovely girl with a heart of gold and does not deserve to be suffering and in pain every single day of her life.

She has vision problems, cognitive difficulties, memory loss, constant headaches, muscle and joint pains, terrible anxiety, hypothyroidism , chronic fatigue, and now cardiac illness. We are so worried for her every single day.
In addition panic attacks, digestive problems, food intolerances and hair loss are just a few of the many other symptoms that she endures yet she battles on with sheer tenacity handling everything that is thrown at her and because she looks normal people do not realise the pain she endures. The heartbreaking thing about Lyme disease is that you can look fine but inside you are dying.

We love our daughter with all our heart and we feel helpless that we cannot give her what she needs. We get little or no help from doctors in the UK. That's a frustration we experience constantly. Lyme disease is dismissed by so many and the battle we have every day to get her some help is beyond belief.

But we will not give up because treatments abroad are far more advanced than we are being offered in the UK so we know there is hope out there.

We are continuing to save frantically to get her treatment as time is of the essence now. We feel embarrased to ask our friends to give us help but it would be so valued and very much appreciated.

We are a proud family who have never asked for anything before but this is a crisis we cannot battle on our own any longer and we would feel forever blessed for her to be given the chance to get treatment abroad. If we can give her hope that she can beat this awful disease and have a pain free life then that would mean the world to us.

If you have children you will understand as a parent how we feel to watch her suffer and struggle every single day of her life. It's unbearable..

Whatever help we receive no matter how big or how small it would be another step closer to us giving her a life back.

We have to stay positive for our daughter because to us she is so precious and we cannot stand to think of her suffering for the rest of her life.

Thank you sincerely from the bottom of our hearts for reading our story and supporting Helen on her journey to better health.

Lorraine & Paul
xx