Schoolboy, 11, 'ageing backwards' left with abilities of baby due to rare disease
A schoolboy has been left with the abilities of a baby due to a rage genetic disease, leaving him with only a decade to live.
Jayden Skidmore, 11, was diagnosed with Duchenne’s muscular dystrophy at the age of five. The condition, which weakens the skeletal and heart muscle, has stopped the child from being able to walk.
The life expectancy for a child with Duchenne’s is 22 years and his family wants to take him on a dream holiday before it becomes too late.
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Mum Jade said: “As Jayden’s mum, I’m absolutely devastated. He used to be able to play football, run and do little bits. Now he’s just in a wheelchair, full-time.
"Deterioration usually starts with the legs, then travels up the body. We’ve been told he could go at any age. I just thought it was my fault. I really blamed myself but, it is what it is - there’s no way we could’ve known.”
Jade said her pregnancy with her son was normal. Normality continued into the early years of his life and he hit early milestones, such as crawling and walking.
The mother believes he started having problems with his motor skills between the ages of three to five when he could not walk properly. Stepdad Sean Dudley and Jade took the tot to see a child development specialist, who gave him a blood test.
In September 2018, the results came back showing Jayden’s creatine levels were at 1600 units-per-litre, and he was told the normal level was supposed to be in the hundreds. He was diagnosed with Duchenne’s muscular dystrophy and Jade had a blood test in the same month, which confirmed she had unknowingly passed the gene down to Jayden.
The condition is similar to the plot of Hollywood film The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, in which star Brad Pitt ages backwards from the start. The family are now raising funds to take Jayden to Florida. As part of fundraising, Sean is taking on one of the world's toughest challenges - which involves rock climbing, swimming and sprinting.
Sean, from York, said: “Time is of the essence - we want Jayden to live the best life he can, while he’s still here. He loves ‘The Rock’ - because I got him into Jumanji. We want him to be able to meet him, we’ve been trying to reach out to him on social media. It would be Jayden’s dream to have a chat with him while in Florida.”
Sean is raising as much money as he can to get him there, in October 2025. He says it’ll cost between £7k to £10k just to fly the three of them over - plus another £1k to £2k in spending money. To do this, he’s taking on an “extremely demanding” physical challenge and hoping for sponsors.
He added: “At the end of the day, Jayden can’t do any of this, so I’ve got no excuse. I’m doing three mountain peaks, multiple times. There are laps I have to run, and lots of swimming - it’s basically to get as much done as I can in a 24-hour period. To train for it, I’m going out on my pushbike and doing three gym sessions a week. I’ll be thinking about Jayden when I’m doing the challenge - he’s a huge motivator.”
The family plan to take Jayden swimming with dolphins in Florida, as well as scuba diving and adapted rock climbing. Their main plan remains helping him to meet The Rock.
Sean said: “It only takes one person in his circle to flag it up to him. I just want to get the word out there, as much as possible. Jayden may not be around for much longer, and I know this would be his dream.”
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