I’d been married for two years to my husband, Peter, and we were looking forward to the birth of our first child.

When I was twenty-three years of age and had the world at my feet was the

…when my life changed.

On the 17th of July 1987, I gave birth to my daughter, Jenna. I was so excited about meeting my first child and took for granted that this would be a time of pure happiness and joy. But for the first week of Jenna’s life, she was critically ill and struggling to survive.

Jenna did survive her birth trauma and came home to live with us when she was a month old, but only four months later she was diagnosed with profound cerebral palsy.

This life event was the start of a difficult thirty year journey as a parent and carer of a child with a major disability.