'I'm relearning how to walk, talk, dance and sing'

A teenage girl who underwent a rare operation, which saw part of her skull stored in her stomach, has been relearning how to walk, talk and swallow.

Ellie, 16, from Crewe, Cheshire, suffered a brain bleed caused by a cavernoma - a group of abnormal blood vessels resembling a raspberry.

She had nine surgeries in the space of 13 weeks last year and feared she would never go home from hospital.

Her mother Joanne, 48, said her daughter was now working "relentlessly" to return to her passion of dancing and performing on stage.

"At one point, I thought I would never go home. But the staff on Ward 4A really looked after me and kept my spirits up," Ellie said, who was a patient at Alder Hey Children's Hospital in Liverpool.

In May last year, she started suffering from persistent headaches and nausea and became sensitive to light.

She initially thought she had a common sickness bug, but by the end of the week she was vomiting up to 16 times a day.

Following blood tests and an MRI, it was discovered Ellie had a bleed on her brain caused by a cavernoma.

The condition does not always cause symptoms, and according to the NHS, about one in every 600 people in the UK is living with symptomless cavernoma.

Each year, about one person in every 400,000 is diagnosed with a cavernoma that has caused symptoms, which usually develop between the ages of 20 and 40.

Joanne said she had not heard of it prior to her daughter's case and had initially hoped her symptoms might simply be due to a bad migraine.

Ellie underwent a procedure at Alder Hey that involved removing part of her skull to relieve pressure, which was stored in her stomach to keep it sterile before it could be put back.

Benedetta Pettorini, consultant paediatric neurosurgeon at Alder Hey, said the procedure was not usually carried out on children Ellie's age but added: "In some selected cases that's the only way to save their lives."

Doctors at Alder Hey have performed fewer than 20 neurosurgeries for cavernomas in the last four years, she said.

Despite the life-saving procedure, Ellie deteriorated further and was rushed to intensive care and subsequently could not talk or move the left side of her body and was only able to communicate by gesturing her thumb up or down.

It took seven weeks before she had any movement in her leg, her mother said.

"Her digits and fingers have been the last to get going, but she's relearnt to walk, talk and swallow.

"She's quite a headstrong, driven kid. We're just now working on physio relentlessly."

Joanne said Ellie's goal was to get back to performing and dancing – something she has done since she was three years old, appearing in pantomimes and in shows on the West End.

"Even after the first surgery when she wasn't talking, Taylor Swift was playing in Liverpool, and the nurses were playing her songs on her iPad.

"She was trying to do a little jiggle in the bed. I knew she was still Ellie."

The 16-year-old returned to the stage recently to sing in a show with her dance class, which her mum described as an "emotional night".

"There are still things I can't do, and it's frustrating, but I know I'll get there. I can't wait to be back on stage, singing and dancing," Ellie said.

Her friends are now fundraising to secure a place for her on an intense therapy programme in London this summer.

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