“She’s a very special child and she’s a fighter,” says Derika Young of her daughter Kandice.

The two-year-old has undergone three operations in her young life and faces constant medical tests at Boston’s Children’s Hospital.

Living with a hole in her heart, congenital heart disease and pulmonary vein stenosis, the little girl faces an everyday life-or-death existence.

Derika, 25, admits that she does “spoil” her youngest child, but says: “You just never know what tomorrow will bring, and so we try to give her as much as possible.”

Kandice lives with her mother, her eight-year-old sister Kyra and brothers Kevon, four, and Kitorri, six, at the family home, in Alexander Road, Devonshire.

Aware that their little sister is poorly, the children help to care for her but also treat her like any other two-year-old.

While Kyra helps to bathe and feed her younger sister, the boys take her outside to play, or as Derika puts it, “help her to get into things she shouldn’t be getting into”.

Kandice is a happy child. She has a favourite doll, Dora, and enjoys colouring and playing outside.

“But she’s not as active as a normal two-year-old,” says Derika.

“Sometimes she gets tired quite quickly and sometimes her breathing is a little abnormal and tight. It happens when she hasn’t got enough oxygen in her lungs.”

Derika has to constantly keep an eye on her youngest child.

“They say if her appetite changes or there are any changes in her normal activity, it could be a sign of heart failure.

“You’ve got to watch her. I have to sleep with one eye open and one eye closed. She gets up in the night every hour — she’s up and then I’m up. My body just gets used to it, I guess, but it is hard to deal with because you never know.”

As well as looking after her Kandice and her siblings, Derika works between 20-28 hours a week as a shop assistant .

She says: “It is stressful at times but I try not to be stressed because with her illness I have to try and keep strong for her.”

Kandice went through her first operation just hours after her birth, after medical staff noticed her fingers were turning blue.

She was flown to the Children’s Hospital where she had a surgical band placed around her heart due to its enlargement.

Derika says: “They were going to remove the band six to nine months later, but when Kandice went back they then diagnosed she had pulmonary vein stenosis.”

She explains: “As her blood circulates through pressure rather than the heart pumping it round, the band works to close off some of the blood vessels and so keep the pressure low, so it does actually help her.

“But as she grows it tightens, cutting the oxygen to her one lung so she turns blue. Eventually, when she is older, the doctors want to remove it.”

In October, surgeons had to connect all of Kandice’s veins and organs to her right lung after the left stopped functioning.

Last month she returned to the hospital for tests and will visit again in July.

Doctors are now discussing the possibility of a different type of surgery.

“The surgery she had in October was a success,” says Derika. “But even though it may be working for her now, it might not later on. So this is why the doctors want to look into this, as it may help her when she’s older.

“This surgery might not be needed for another two to five years. Or they might not need to do it at all. It all depends on her pulmonary veins.”

Derika has been told that Kandice can survive on one lung, but it makes her more vulnerable to infections.

“It makes her very prone to catching viruses, such as flu, because she doesn’t have a spleen. It means she also has to take antibiotics for the rest of her life,” says Derika.

Most of Kandice’s treatment is paid for by her father Kevin Douglas’s medical insurance. The costs run into hundreds of thousands of dollars — Kandice’s last operation in October cost $135,000.

On top of this, however, every few months Derika must find $600 to $800 for her and her daughter’s airfares, $500 for a fortnight’s accommodation and money for food, for the duration of the US hospital visit.

Following an operation, Kandice can spend up to five days in the ICU.

Derika says: “When she’s in ICU, as she’s under a lot of drugs, she doesn’t worry too much but when she goes on a general ward she tends to want to have someone there.

“And when she’s by herself she can get a bit weepy.

“She just accepts the medical procedures though and takes everything in her stride. She’s never complained. She sometimes has her times when she just wants her mama, but other times she’s very outgoing.

“She’s my pride and joy. I don’t know what I would do if anything happened to her. I love her very much.”

Derika says any donations towards Kandice’s treatment from the Marathon Derby will “help tremendously”.

Committee President Dr Gina Tucker said she was inspired to choose Kandice as her ‘President’s Pick’ after a photograph appeared in The Royal Gazette showing her and her sister Kyra trying to raise funds at a bake sale.

Dr. Tucker said: “When I saw the picture this person touched my heart. It’s so heart-wrenching when a very little child is sick and she is so beautiful.”

Derika says: “We are very thankful to the committee. It means that if something serious happens and we have to rush her to hospital then at least we will have the funds.”