Harold Hill youngster’s family launch fundraising drive for £45,000 operation

Mayzi and her dad Paul (Image: Archant)

Little Mayzi Price, four, has a form of cerebral palsy and can only stand with a walking frame for a few minutes before falling down.

Her loved ones have launched a fundraising drive to pay for an operation which will lessen the stiffness in her lower limbs.

Her mum Stacie Eagle, 24, of Hitchin Close, Harold Hill, was encouraged to go ahead with it by family and parents at a physiotherapy centre in Oxford.

She said: “We had already heard about it, but I was against it.

Mayzi and her dad Paul (Image: Archant)

“I was worried about the risks that come with being put under and my main fear was that it could all go wrong.

“But I spoke to some mums whose children had the operation and it convinced me.”

Mayzi has a form of cerebral palsy called spastic diplegia, the same as four-year-old Freddy Hazelwood, the youngster who the Recorder previously reported as taking his first steps after a selective dorsal rhizotomy.

This is the operation Mayzi’s family hope she can have, but in the UK rather than America.

The cost of the operation and after-care is estimated to be around £45,000.

It was only when Mayzi was nine months old that Stacie, who also has a son Logan, 18 months, noticed there could be something wrong.

She said: “It was just seeing others walking and running around, doing usual child things and how they had progressed.

“I noticed Mayzi wasn’t hitting her milestones.”

The youngster had an MRI scan at 14 months and two months later it was confirmed she had cerebral palsy.

Her mum said: “I was heartbroken. I couldn’t even remember what was said because I couldn’t take it in.”

The family hope to raise enough money in time for an operation in January, through events such as a fun day.

Stacie said: “When Mayzi first took the steps on her frame I was just blubbing away.

“This would just change her life. It would change everything.”

To donate, visit justgiving.com/stacie-eagle.