Catherine Davies, paralysed from the neck down after George Taylor ploughed his car into her Skoda, desperately wishes she could hold her son close and touch his face
A mum left paralysed after a teen driver crashed into her while driving with his knees has shared the agony at being unable to hug her son.
Catherine Davies, 51, can’t even say “I love you” to her boy as she is paralysed from the neck down, and has had surgery to fuse her neck together following the horrific crash.
She had a cardiac arrest and was given life-saving care by an off-duty paramedic, but doctors in hospital feared Catherine wouldn’t survive her catastrophic brain injury and spinal damage. The mum, who was a fitness instructor, pulled through but now requires 24-hour care, and the pain of being unable to even hold her son close or bury her nose in his soft blond hair and breathe him in.
Speaking through a “eye-gaze” machine, the technology she must now rely on to make herself heard, Catherine said: “I really miss the tactile side of being a mum and this destroys me. Understanding the nature of my injuries was absolutely terrifying. I cannot describe the fear. It was all-consuming. I always wanted to be a mum and get great joy from it. My son is the most important person to me in the world.”
In her first interview since the horror crash, which happened in January 2023, mum-of-one Catherine described how different life was with her son before the injuries. She added: “When [he] was with me, my time was focused on him, supporting with schoolwork and, in his free time, doing activities with him which were usually outside. We would go on walks, visit the beach and meet up with friends who had children of a similar age. My life was wonderful and going in the right direction.”
George Taylor, then 17, was driving a VW Golf dangerously behind Catherine on January 18, 2023, on his way to college. He used his phone nine times while driving, sending text messages, taking calls and making several horrifying videos showing himself steering with his knees, and overtaking other vehicles at speed.
He careered into Catherine’s blue Skoda Fabia at a busy junction near Hockering, Norfolk. After CPR was performed at the roadside by the off-duty paramedic, the mum was airlifted to hospital. Catherine’s horrified family were told there was a 50:50 chance she would die during the operation, which involved inserting metal rods into her neck – but they felt it was the only option.
It was a success and, from mid-February 2023, she was in a high-dependency unit, now conscious and trying desperately to come to terms with her new, awful reality. She would spends many more months in hospital.
But Taylor, who had reached for a vape seconds before the impact, was jailed for just two years and two months this week. The punishment handed out to the teenager, who had held his licence for less than 12 weeks when he crashed, was described as “insulting” by Catherine.
The former fitness instructor told the Daily Mail: “He took my whole life away and left me in a living nightmare. I understand he may only have to serve half the sentence, so will be free in a year’s time to get on with his life, whereas I have been imprisoned for life.”
And the mum has lost the ability to run her beloved fitness business, been forced to leave the cottage where she lived with her son, and now faces a future stripped of all the things she used to love: city breaks, spa days with friends, windswept runs on the beach.
A crowdfunding campaign, run by friends and family, raised more than £20,000 to buy the eye-gaze machine, so she could use eye movement to control a computer, communicate with her son and access social media.
Taylor appeared at Norwich Crown Court where he admitted causing serious injury by dangerous driving. The young defendant, who is expecting a child of his own in February, will serve his sentence in a young offender institution, and also faces a 40-month driving ban.
