Once back home I went straight back to bed and if it wasn't for the bad instinct that my mum and dad had I wouldn't have survived. They come up to check on me and my mum tells me that my feet were stone cold, my blood was staying near my major organs and I had marks on my body. My mum and dad instantly took me to the hospital; by the time we got there my eyes were all bloodshot. I don't remember a lot about what happened after getting to the hospital, but my mum tells me I was put on the high dependency ward and that the doctor feared it would get worse and I was likely to go on to intensive care.
After a lot of operating, things were finally getting better. I was put back on to a normal ward where I was assessed a lot. The nurse would come every couple of hours to check my blood pressure and I would hate the squeezing of it on my arm. The hospital allowed me to have a Playstation in my room and it was great because all the other children would come through the day and play on it with me and it made me forget a lot about the illness I had. Also my Grandad would come and see me every day at the same time and bring me chocolate.
My main motivation I think of getting through and overcoming my illness was the fact that my dad had got me tickets to go and watch wrestling at the Manchester Evening News Arena. I loved the wrestling was when I was younger and it was all I could think about throughout my time in hospital. I was in hospital around three weeks. On my last day in hospital Manchester United – my favourite football team – had won the treble and the hospital allowed me to leave for the night to watch the wrestling.
Thinking back now, I release how lucky I am for overcoming this illness and I owe a lot to all the people who helped me during that period, especially my mum and dad and all of my family. I also send my condolences to all the families who have lost people due to meningococcal septicaemia.
Joshua Eppleston
November 2011