Unboxing My Son’s New 3D-Printed Hand

15 years ago we gave birth to a 4lb 9oz baby boy, I was overjoyed with happiness. I wanted to hold him up to the skies like Simba from the Lion King, but at Wordsley Hospital they’re not that keen for you to do stuff like that, so I settled for the giddiness of being able to buy Star Wars figures for my lad.

He was taken away as he was premature. His mum was taken to a ward to recover and I popped in to see my little (very little) lad. I stood over him looking at him taking in every hair, every pore on his body and thought to myself “I made that” looking back I now realize his mum had a lot to do with it too. Cheers!

Then I realized he had no fingers on his left hand. I was devastated. I burst into tears. This goes against my rule: you’re only allowed to cry if someone dies, stubbing toes, severe physical pains and onions are allowed.

In my head I jumped into the future, they’re going to pick on him and school, then something smacked me right in the heart “He’s not going to be able to play a Gameboy”

Well they don’t pick on him at school and he’s a wiz on the DS, Xbox, iPad, PC ..to be honest I needn’t have worried. Can’t get him off the damn things, he’s a pewdie pie addict (bros) too!

Years ago we raised some money doing a 24 hour charity show to get Joe a decent prosthetic, a cosmetic one and that was great and I just want to give thanks to all those who helped.

A few months back I saw a video on YouTube about a kid receiving this 3d printed hand, it was a amazing. Someone out there had given this little lad a chance to be able to pick something up, something we all take for granted. If I recall the first thing he did was “look, I can hold my hand” as he grasped them together. It was very moving.

I went on the website and contacted them. I sent them pictures of Joe’s arms with a tape measure down the center and then they said they would find me a volunteer in the UK. His name is James and he’s a bloody star! We chatted via email, he sent me bits of plastic so I could measure the width of my son’s left hand (lucky fin, watch Finding Nemo for reference).

We spoke back and forth and he sent me various styles, Joe went for the steam punk look in black. James even brought in some back leather so it could match. The 3rd of February it arrived and we did and unboxing I’ve posted a video up on YouTube for you to see, he’s pretty happy with it.

I just want to thank enablingthefuture.org for connecting me with James, you’ve given us a real life changer.

I’m going to save some money to get my own 3d printing kit so I can create stuff like this and put something into the world. (So buy my art!)

Just one more shout out to my boss Hani Mostafa at @gumsaver, he has got the same kind of ethics as these people, he wants to change the world too. I want to thank him for his support .

You know something? The world is a pretty good place.