A mother’s six-year-old son suffers from a rare disease. He has to eat everything from carpets to Lego blocks and grass. She is building a special garden at her home in Stevenage, Hertfordshire. His son saved his life.

Nate Francis' severe learning difficulties, coupled with life-threatening allergies and a rare disease called Pica, forced him to eat everything from carpets to Lego.

Pica is a condition that forces you to eat non-food items, such as chalk, paint, stones, and clothes. These items have no nutritional value. Some objects will pass through your body without causing harm. However, pica can be very dangerous. It can cause health problems such as teeth and stomach problems.

Sarah Lee, 40, said: "We have removed everything he can eat directly, but there are always things we haven't considered, such as the paint on the walls and the fibers of the carpet.

"He managed to find a small scratch on the wall, and now he is pulling out the paint.

"He pulled up the fiber of the carpet and tried to eat it."

She added: "And he is currently chewing on the railings of the stairs."

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Thanks to the generous donations of friends and strangers, Sarah and her 41-year-old chef partner Tom Francis raised enough money to replace their garden hedges with new fences and replace the existing concrete, stone and grass with artificial turf. This is their son Nate's six-year-old Francis couldn't tear it open and put it in his mouth.

Sarah said: "Nate also has life-threatening food and environmental allergies, and his pica means he eats everything except real food.

"One of my biggest concerns is that pica means he will be choked by something because he doesn't know it shouldn't get into his mouth.

"It's been a long time since we were able to take him to the garden because he only wanted to grab a few stones."

She added: “We kept pulling his hands away from his mouth, and once they got there, we would pull things out of his mouth.

"And he also had a terrible reaction to grass pollen because he tried to eat grass."

Sarah first noticed signs of Nate’s learning difficulties when she was 18 months old. When she noticed that he was easily disturbed by noise, she organized a "milestone" test for Nate and Nate was subsequently diagnosed. Out of autism with "severe" learning difficulties, the diagnosis was made after his second birthday.

Sarah must always be alert to Nate. She said that he often puts stones, dirt and sand in his mouth, and he is allergic to grass pollen, so spending a simple afternoon outside or a trip to the park is very important. Dangerous task.

She said: "His eyes were swollen and could not be opened. It was terrible, but he didn't understand why or what caused it to happen.

"Sadly, we cannot explain to him because he currently does not have that level of communication.

"His learning difficulties exacerbated the risk because he did not feel dangerous and was unable to connect his radical allergic reaction to the fact that he had eaten grass."

Trying to share their home with Sarah’s 18-year-old eldest son, Joshua Kingham, "Nate-friendly" is a difficult task for the couple-they have raised more than £3,500 for their barrier-free garden through GoFundMe, and now hope Raising more funds for the new house fencing-said their son is still trying to eat the paint on the staircase railings and walls.

She said: "Once he starts to react, he doesn't know what happened or why it happened."

Nate's allergies were obvious before his autism and pica were diagnosed, when he was only 10-11 months old.

Sarah said: "This happened when I was weaning him, it was really scary."

Sarah added: "I was eating scrambled eggs for him and he immediately spit them out.

"They fell on the skin and fingers around his neck, where he touched, he immediately developed hives, and his eyes immediately swelled up."

Eggs are not the only thing Nate is allergic to: shellfish, eggs, grass pollen, fish, hazelnuts, chia seeds, sesame seeds, kiwi, limes and pineapples, dust mites, and other things show bad allergic reactions.

"When he tried to pull up and eat the carpet, it became a danger," Sarah said.

"Life is different from what we imagined. We hope we can participate in activities such as family holidays, but we only know that it's impossible now," Sarah added.

"We live a very, very different life from before. We can't go to busy places or similar places, nor can we go to typical family outings."

She said that seemingly small things, such as putting plastic grass in the garden, would have a huge impact on his quality of life.

However, despite the difficulties, Sarah still loves Nate and will not change him for the sake of this world.

She said: "I just embraced who Nate is. It's great to be able to walk into his world.

To donate to Nate’s GoFundMe, please visit https://www.gofundme.com/f/an-accessible-garden-for-nate

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