The mother of a teenager who is the same size as a toddler has called his unnamed condition the ‘happy syndrome’.
Angus Palmes, 13, weighs just 2st and 2lbs, the same size as an average toddler, and his condition is so rare it doesn’t even have a name.
His mother Tandy, 48, from Macclesfield, Cheshire, realised there was some different something different about her son while she was pregnant and Angus wasn’t kicking.
After struggling to get a diagnosis, doctors realised that he had a chromosome abnormality, with doctors calling his unique condition a ‘personal syndrome’ because he’s the only person in the world battling it.
Angus communicates by wiggling his thumb and fingers and is able to walk while holding his mother’s hand.
Speaking on Friday’s This Morning, Tandy called Angus’ condition a ‘happy syndrome’ because he’s always laughing.
Tandy Palmes’ 13 year old son Angus has the body the same size as an average toddler. The mother and son appeared on This Morning on Friday to discuss his condition
Tandy said: ‘There’s over a million children in the UK who all have disabilities and Angus is actually one of a kind, he’s completely unique in every single way.
‘I just wanted to bring to everybody’s attention that it’s not just the bog standard, I don’t want to say bog standard, syndromes like down syndrome.
‘There are actually a lot of children with what they call “personal syndromes”, who fight a lot of battles because people don’t recognise them, so they struggle sometimes to get services and stuff like that.’
Tandy calls Angus’ personal syndrome the ‘happy syndrome’ because of his good nature.
‘I just call it a personal syndrome – a happy syndrome – because he laughs so much.’
Angus Palmes (pictured) weights just 2st and 2lbs and has a rare chromosome abnormality
Angus is 3ft 1ins tall and was diagnosed with chromosome translocation of 15/22 with partial trisomy of 22q12.3 when he was three weeks old.
He takes 250 doses of medicine each week and has been defying doctors for more than 10 years.
His mother began realising something was wrong during her pregnancy because Angus’ brother had ‘kicked like a footballer’ but he was completely still.
Doctors told Tandy her baby was fine and it wasn’t until after he was born that he began to be recognised as a baby with additional needs.
Tandy said: ‘When a child’s born they do the regular tests on them and he didn’t respond accordingly so he was taken into special care. We were going to be released after 10 days and unfortunately he had a seizure and I think we got home after about two and half weeks.
‘We had no idea there was anything wrong, although they had their suspicions. So they basically took us in an ambulance and we went to one of the Manchester hospitals and they did some genetic tests.
‘Three weeks after that they were able to tell me that they’d found this unique chromosome abnormality and they found it by accident.’
Angus communicates by wiggling his thumb and fingers, demonstrating the gesture on This Morning today.
Angus demonstrated how he communicates on This Morning by wiggling his fingers to say hello
He is also able to walk while holding Tandy’s hand, leading her to where he wants to go and pointing things out to her.
She said: ‘He’s actually standing on two feet and almost walking, at some stage they thought that wouldn’t happen. He had an operation earlier this year and it’s been completely life changing because before that he had acid reflux.’
Tandy is hopeful for Angus’ future but admits that he will never be able to live independently.
‘He’s never going to be able to live an independent life so he’s always going to be dependent on me but we just sort of work it out and get it along,’ she explained.
The youngster, who stopped growing when he was three, beat meningitis at the age of two and recently had a series of surgeries to tackle a problem in his digestive system.
Tandy estimates that her son has gone under the knife more than 40 times in his short life – including regular injections of botox to stop him from drooling.
But despite running the gauntlet of people staring in the street, his mother is determined for Angus to live as positive a life as possible.
He’s a regular fixture down at the local cricket club to cheer on eldest sibling Otis, 15 – who stands at a strapping 6ft and dotes on his little brother.
The teenager (pictured) was diagnosed with the rare condition when he was three weeks old
Tandy previously said: ‘The odds have been stacked against Angus from the start. Otis is a very big lad and people never believe there’s only two years between them.
‘Angus is still in clothes for people ten years younger than him. It’s like dealing with a pre-toddler at that stage just before the start walking.
‘He’s not completely without motor skills but he can’t talk so he’s devised his own version of sign language.
‘It’s a few basic hand signals that he does. Everybody who works with him or knows him knows what they are.
‘If he’s happy, he sticks out his thumb and index finger and jiggles them simultaneously.’
A typical day will see Angus and his mother head to the local park for a walk – where he’s a bit of a local celebrity – before spending the afternoon watching his favourite DVDs.
Ms Palmes said: ‘He always wakes up with a smile on his face, laughing.
‘He absolutely loves DVDs. The Jungle Book, Curious George, Fantasia – he’ll watch those over and over again.’
She added: ‘He was born with several little holes in his heart and something called a hemivertebrae, which means that he’s got some vertebrae in his back that are only partially formed.
‘He was also born with talipes (club foot) and chronic gastric reflux, so there’s been a mountain of health issues from the start.
Angus, who can’t walk unaided, usually gets around in a wheelchair but enjoys ‘bum-shuffling’ around the house
‘He’s had open-heart surgery, his feet corrected with something called Ponseti treatment, the fundoplication for his gastroesophageal reflux. You name it, he’s had it.
‘He had corrective surgery on the gastric problems in the past few months and that’s been life-changing.’
Doctors only spotted Angus’s chromosome abnormality by accident while carrying out routine checks on the newborn.
Recalling the moment she found out about her son’s life-changing condition, his mother said: ‘They didn’t tell me he was going to be like a child for the rest of his life.
‘They said they found it by accident and unfortunate thing was they had no record of anybody else having it. There’s a few kids that are close but not the same.’
Ms Palmes, formerly a facilities manager in the City of London, now cares for Angus full-time. She split from the boys’ father, 48-year-old James, three years ago.
Through a recent partnership between retail giant Marks and Spencer and disabled kids charity Newlife, Angus now has a new £2,200 portable safety sleeper for the four nights a month he spends at James’s home in Alderley Edge.
His mother added: ‘He’s like a baby that’s never grown up. You still have to have a child seat in the car and allyour bits to take out with you.’
Angus will never be able to live independently but can walk with a helping hand from Tandy