Lucas Whitelegg is finally ready to embrace the world with both arms after spending 10 months with his entire body paralysed by botulism.

Three days after celebrating his first birthday, Lucas will on Friday wave goodbye to the Monash Children’s Hospital staff who helped him through 241 days in intensive care and the gradual return of his movement from the pure form of Botox. For Lucas’ mother Bree Bailey it will mark the end of nightmare that began when he was 8 1/2 weeks old and ingested a spore that sprouted botulism in his belly, which then spread through his bloodstream and paralysed his entire body.

One of only 13 cases of botulism in Victoria in the last five years, doctors had to retrieve a $100,000 antitoxin from the US to save Lucas and then wait for the paralysis to wear off.

It was weeks before Lucas could even open his eyes, three months before his fingers and toes wiggled, and eight months before his lungs and diaphragm freed up allowing him to breath without a ventilator.