Appeal will give Tom a window on the world (From Wilts and Gloucestershire Standard)

Appeal will give Tom a window on the world

FOUR months ago an appeal was started to help bring paralysed teenager Tom Tooley back home to Cirencester.

Since then thousands of Standard readers have been involved in organising and attending fundraising events and have raised an incredible £16,000.

Events have ranged from football tournaments, theatre productions, quizzes and concerts to a leg wax, parachute jump, sweepstake and trampoline marathon.

The funds are already being used on the extension to the Tooley family home and has meant construction work could begin much earlier than anticipated.

Tom's Friends treasurer Rosa Feeney said: "It will be a bedroom and bathroom just for Tom.

"The architects came and discussed it with him and he wanted low windows so he could look out and there will also be an entrance built giving him his own access."

With donations from vast numbers of our readers and various organisations as well as the fundraising events, the first appeal target was met quickly and led to the appeal being extended.

Tom, who attended Cirencester Deer Park School, was left completely paralysed after an operation to remove a brain tumour last April.

Although the operation was successful a post operative stroke left him unable to walk, talk or even swallow.

Over the last few months Tom has regained some movement and in the middle of May this year he left the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery in London to move to a rehabilitation centre in Oxford.

The move has meant he can go on day trips and various outings enable him to once again become accustomed to living outside a hospital ward. In an email Tom says to all the readers of the Standard: "Thank you so much for supporting me and my family during this hard period by making so much money.

"I have been following closely all the fund raising events.

"I have been amazed at people's generosity and the hard work and time people have been willing to put in for me.

"This money will enable me to live my life at home. "I can't wait to be home.

"Thanks very much."

* Future events in aid of the Tom Tooley Appeal will still be publicised by the Standard. Email elizabeth@wiltsglosstandard.co.uk