Charlie's Story

Meet Charlie, 13, who loves swimming, soft play and the trampoline in Rose Road’s garden, always has a mischievous look in his eyes and giggles at almost anything!

Charlie stays at Rose Road for 36 nights a year and attends half term and school holiday playschemes.

Charlie’s needs are complex. Due to his Autism, ADHD, learning disability and Pica (an eating disorder in which a person seeks out and eats non-food items), Charlie needs continuous supervision and 1-2-1 support and sleeps in a ‘safe space’ bed, a special bed in which a young person can be enclosed over night to ensure their safety. And recently, Charlie started being fed with a nasogastric tube due to an issue with his oesophagus, for which staff have needed additional clinical training.

Tina Fulbrook, Head of Care here at Rose Road, explains: “We are looking after more young people like Charlie whose needs are complex and changing, and with this comes new challenges.

We only have one safe space bed in each of Rose Road’s two respite units, despite being needed by eleven young people now, which limits who can stay when.

We need to carry out more clinical procedures related to a young person’s care which requires higher levels of training, and we need more staff to meet the needs of young people who need 1-1 or even 2-1 care.

But we will always work to overcome these challenges, because we see everyday how it makes a positive difference to the lives of these young people and their families.

Toni, one of Charlie’s Support Workers says: “Charlie’s time at Rose Road has helped improve his focus and he’s become more self-sufficient; he seeks out activities he enjoys and often takes himself off to do a puzzle. While still being reliant on staff, we’re watching him develop new independence skills and that’s very rewarding.”

Charlie’s family benefit too.

Caroline, Charlie’s mum says, “We’re really happy that Charlie has the support he needs at Rose Road to be safe and happy. Rose Road’s care is flexible, which is really important to us because sometimes he stays for one night, or sometimes we save them up. For example, when I got married, he stayed for 4 nights while still attending the wedding itself, so we could be a family at the most important moment, and know he was safe and happy when we needed to be able to focus on organising the big day!”

Our Big Give Christmas Challenge

As we support more young people like Charlie, we need to be able to take the time to understand their increasingly complex and individual needs, and work with them and their family to develop personally tailored care plans that meet the needs of the whole family.

The money you help us to raise during the Big Give Christmas Challenge will start solving some of the challenges we’re seeing more often at Rose Road.

Please donate this week when your donation will be matched, doubling the impact of your gift this Christmas. Thank you.