St Albans parents have rallied together to help a football-mad little boy who suffers from a rare form of leukaemia.
Two-year-old Sebbie Cairns, who lives in College Place, St Albans, was diagnosed with Acute Myeloid Leukaemia when he was just nine months old. He came out of hospital last year but relapsed, and is now at Great Ormond Street waiting for a bone marrow transplant.
Sebbie’s mum Rotha is staying at the hospital with her son while his dad, Mark, looks after their two other children, Alexander, seven, and Charlotte, six. Charlotte is a genetic match and will be donating bone marrow to her brother.
Friends of Sebbie’s parents and other parents from the Abbey School, which Alexander and Charlotte attend, have organised a coffee morning to support Sebbie and are helping take care of his brother and sister after school.
Rotha’s friend Natalie Patel said: “We are doing the coffee morning to raise awareness and some money to help them through this difficult time.
“Rotha would like to raise awareness of the importance of giving blood and getting on the stem cell donors register. Sebbie has had so many blood transfusions and when he gets blood he sort of perks up a bit.”
Natalie has organised the coffee morning, which will be held in Marlborough Road Church Hall, alongside Abbey School parents Cora van Rooijen and Geraldine Gardner.
They are also taking part in a campaign Rotha started to get football shirts for Sebbie to wear in hospital, using the hashtag #sebbieshirts.
Natalie said: “Rotha posted on Facebook asking if people are selling second hand football shirts because Sebbie needs lots of changes of clothes when in hospital.
“He’s absolutely football obsessed for a two-year-old. Rotha said they are easy to wash and dry while in the hospital.
“A couple of us posted this on our own Facebook pages, and another Abbey School mum has a second hand children’s boutique and she put it on her Facebook.”
The mums will be auctioning a shirt signed by the Spurs Under-21s first team at the coffee morning, which will also feature a raffle and a tombola.
Another Abbey School parent, Andrew Page, will be running the London Marathon in April next year in support of Sebbie.
Natalie said: “It’s just that feeling of how amazing the community is in supporting a local child and their family. The Abbey School parents are absolutely amazing. They’ve taken on Charlotte and Alexander and care for those kids every day after school until Mark gets home.”
Geraldine said: “We all feel very emotional about it and it tugs on a massive cord for people with young children.”
The coffee morning will be held at Marlborough Road Church Hall from 9.30am to midday on Friday, November 24.
Rotha is urging people to sign up to donors at either https://www.dkms.org.uk/en or https://www.anthonynolan.org/A GoFundMe page has also been set up for Sebbie at https://www.gofundme.com/stalbanssupportseb
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