KELTY HEARTS have donated £1,000 to a brave young fan.

Charlie Hobbs is just nine, suffers through daily seizures and has been diagnosed with both epilepsy and Functional Neurological Disorder (FND). He's been involved with the club since he was five and to help with medical costs, the Sunday Drinkers have now stumped up £1,000.

Charlie's mum, Gemma, told the Press: "He's a brave boy. We could have a different life and a different outlook but at the end of the day, we've got this so we take each day as it comes and hopefully in the future there will be some other research and help."

Being diagnosed with epilepsy when he was just four was an adjustment but after receiving the FND diagnosis in the middle of the pandemic, his family had even more to navigate.

"In April last year, Charlie kept having all these different types of seizures and he was diagnosed with Functional Neurological Disorder which is a condition that is maybe not that well-known, especially in children.

"We had a bit of a year dealing with that and being out of the football but the club have been great. They've always kept him involved. He got to do the mascot and he got to lay wreaths at the memorial.

"When they said about the money I was a bit like, 'Oh I don't want to take it because there are other kids that are equally needing it' but it is great for us. Charlie has a monitor he wears at night time that records his stats."

The generous donation will go towards the upkeep of his monitor and any other vital medication or equipment he may need, Charlie's monitor, for example, has literally helped his family sleep at night.

"It just gives us the reassurance at night that his heart rate and his oxygen levels are good because, with the epileptic seizures, they were happening during the night and he would stop breathing and that was quite frightening.

"All during the lockdown he kept having these ones and we would have to stay up all night to watch him."

Charlie's family are incredibly grateful for the donation. While there is no medication to treat FND, and no cure, Gemma is continuing to try different things to make her son's life as normal as possible.

She continued: "The money will be going towards that and just trying to find other things that might help, like a nutritionist. Just anything that we can try, anything at all!

"It's really tough and when he was first diagnosed with FND, it was quite hard because there wasn't enough information. The epilepsy we can deal with, there's medication, but there is no 'magic pill' for FND so we just have to manage that every day.

"We hope that we have good days and then on the bad days we just deal with it. It is difficult, I'm not going to lie."

Charlie can have up to 20 seizures a day, because of this he can only go to school for half days. Despite this, Charlie and his family remain positive. Gemma, alongside dad Dennis, his sister, Daisy, and even their dog all keep an eye on him!

"We've got a wee dog and he kind of senses them as well! It's all in the family, we all just go, 'Oh here we go' and when he comes back out of it we go, 'Right, OK, let's get back to dinner!'

"It's just trying to make his life as normal as possible but when you have seizures every day it's quite difficult."