A mother was left feeling guilty after accidentally breaking her son's Pride of Birmingham Award while doing housework. The statuette was restored by ceramics expert Kirsten Ramsey on The Repair Shop: Beyond the Barn, a BBC programme.
During Wednesday's (October 21) episode, viewers saw Mikey Akers from Coventry and his mum Louisa share the story behind the award. In 2018, Mikey was 16 when he won a Pride of Birmingham Award for his campaigning to raise awareness about verbal dyspraxia, a rare neurological speech disorder he was diagnosed with at age two.
Mikey's Campaign and Diagnosis
Mikey struggled to learn to speak and needed intensive speech therapy throughout his childhood. At 13, he wrote a poem called I Am The Boy about his struggles and set up campaign organisation Mikey's Wish to support other young people with the condition.
Louisa explained: "It affects the messages from the brain to the mouth, and they struggle to move the muscles and the nerves in order to form the sounds needed for speech." Mikey added: "Growing up with verbal dyspraxia was quite lonely. People outside of my family struggled to understand what I was saying. It was quite common that people thought I weren't as intelligent because of my speech. It was very frustrating."
The Accident and Restoration
Mikey called the award his "proudest achievement". However, the angel-like trophy was damaged when Louisa knocked it off a shelf while doing housework, shattering it. "When it shattered, I was mortified. I felt so guilty", Louisa told the camera.
Kirsten was determined to make the award look brand-new again and said, "You don't get this unless you've done something quite extraordinary." The expert noted it would be tricky to recreate the shiny surface because of the broken pieces that needed reattaching.
Emotional Reunion
When Mikey and Louisa collected the award, Louisa said she "just wanted to see it back in one piece again." Kirsten managed to make the statuette look brand new, leaving Mikey elated. "Oh wow, Thank you", he told Kirsten, while Louisa joked: "The guilt has gone", as the mother and son giggled.
Louisa added: "I am proud of him", as Mikey confirmed: "It brings me back to when I first got it, it's a nice feeling." Kirsten commented: "You're clearly an inspiration to many, many people, which really spurred me on to try and do the best job that I possibly could, and It's ready to go back to whatever safe spot you've got for it."
The Repair Shop Beyond the Barn is available to stream on BBC iPlayer.
