The Boy in a Million

But what they didn't hear was that there is a further, far more drastic option to corrective surgery - amputation.

Jordan Whitewood-Neal, 10, and his campaigning parents Tracey and Dean have been inundated by good wishes, gifts and offers of help since the programme.

They included a chauffeur-driven trip to see his favourite team, Chelsea, play on Wednesday night.

Jordan's gritty determination to overcome his handicaps and his mother's devoted campaigning on his behalf shone through the moving programme.

But the crucial family decision now is whether Jordan should be subjected to further surgery in a bid to stem the spread of his painful and crippling condition.

Originally billed as Boy In A Million, the title of Monday's hour-long Channel 4 documentary was swapped by programme planners at the 11th hour.

The Boy With Proteus Syndrome was a uniquely Bexhill documentary - featuring the struggle the family face in seeking the best of the limited options for Jordan's future and sensitively but objectively directed by Bexhillian Julia Stovell.

Julia embarked on the year-old project after Jordan was featured in Bexhill Observer front page story in April, 2004.

On screen, Jordan summed-up his feelings with characteristic directness: "I would like to have straight legs and a straight neck..."

The syndrome has been attacking his body since he was a toddler, causing his hands and feet to grow at an abnormal rate and twisting his legs out of shape.

Viewers saw him battling gamely to combat not only what the syndrome has done to his body but the reactions of unthinking strangers who stare at him.

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