Grace Beauchamp-Strachan

Grace Beauchamp-Strachan
Biographical information
Born	August-November 2005 (age 18–19)
Familial information
Parents	Sam Strachan Connie Beauchamp
Other relatives	Audrey Strachan (grandmother) William Chase (grandfather) Kieron Patel (half-brother)
Appearance information
First appearance	"Losing Grip" 29 November 2014
Portrayed by	Emily Carey

Grace Beauchamp (born August-November 2005) is the daughter of Connie Beauchamp and Sam Strachan. Connie originally took care of Grace until 2015 when she moved to New York to live with her father. However, she returned with him in 2016 when he was in the UK at a conference involving cardiothoracics. Grace currently attends Holby Grammar School.

Biography

Grace is born seven weeks premature and in the breech position. As she was starved of oxygen, she has to spend some time in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit. After a scan shows that she has a bleed on the brain and internal bleeding, Grace is placed on a ventilator. Grace almost dies from an Intraventricular hemorrhage and has to have a blood transfusion. Connie decides to turn off Grace's life support when her ECG results show minimal brain-stem activity. When Doctor Ooma Chowdry  asks Connie if she wants to hold Grace, Connie declines, but Sam holds her and notices she is breathing on her own. Grace pulls through and Connie allows Sam increased access to his daughter. Sam ask Maddy to look after Grace and while Grace is in a room on her own, Susie Prendergast kidnaps Grace, thinking she is her baby sister. She threatens to drop Grace on her head, but Sam and Maddy persuade Susie to give her back. When Grace is 10 months old, she falls down the stairs and is badly injured. She is rushed to the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit and undergoes surgery for a collapsed lung and nearly dies. Grace leaves with Connie, who has decided to care for her father, who has been diagnosed with cancer.

A few years later, Grace is expelled from boarding school and returns to Holby. Her relationship with her mother suffers as Connie spends a lot of time at work. Sam's mother Audrey insisted that she would be better off living in New York with him. Grace took a liking to Zoe which caused Connie to become jealous that she never had that kind of bond with Grace. Eventually, it became obvious that Connie's work life and time for Grace couldn't exist simultaneously, as it was becoming too much for her. In January 2015 Grace moved to New York to live with her father and half-brother Kieron.

In May 2015, Connie left Grace a message on her phone while in Bucharest with Charlie. Later that year in November, Cal asked Connie if she thought Grace was better off without all the chaos in Connie's life. Connie just looked at him in shock and walked away, still clearly emotional about the earlier events.

In February 2016, Grace called Connie from a hotel in Holby to tell her that her father's girlfriend Emma was having severe stomach aches. Connie sent an ambulance to collect them but upon arrival at the ED Grace wasn't interested in bonding with Connie but just wanted her to treat Emma. Sam also arrived and insisted that Emma be brought to a private hospital but Connie explained that there was no time. Eventually Connie was able to perform the procedure in the ED with some help from Jac Naylor and earned back Grace's respect for her.

The following week, Grace suffered a panic attack after she overheard Connie telling Jacob that she didn't want her to live with her. She was able to be calmed down by Connie and Jacob, and was preparing to leave with Sam later that day to go back to New York. However, as she boarded the connecting private jet to the New York flight, Connie and Jacob drove there to catch up to her. Grace met Connie at the steps, and Connie told her that she wasn't going to let her go again. The following week, Connie took the day off work to have a girls day out with Grace.

Towards the end of March, Connie was once again forced to bring Grace into work with her as her child minder was ill. Whilst their, she asked Connie if she could see Jacob, due to the fact they got along well during her last encounter in the ED. Connie eventually asked Jack to look after Grace for the day, and he kept her entertained and even prank called Noel at reception together. At the end of the day, Grace saw Connie kissing Jacob which annoyed her. Back in the car, Grace gave her an ultimatum to choose her or Jacob.

In April, Connie decided to choose Grace over Jacob and broke up with him. Connie was later trapped in a small room in the basement of a building with Jacob with sand quickly filling it up, burying them. When they were both unable to move, Connie was able to contact Grace on the radio through to the ED and told her how much she loved her. After they had successfully been rescued, Connie returned to the ED and went straight to see Grace.

Towards the end of May, Connie took the day off work to attend Grace's sports day. Connie won the egg and spoon race against another competitive mother, Steph Sims. Grace got annoyed as she wanted to become friends with Carmel, Steph's daughter and wanted to stay on their good side. Later on during the child and parent's sack race, Grace and Connie worked together to purposely lose so Grace could become friends with Carmel.

Connie's car plummeting off the ledge with her and Grace inside.

After the sports day, Carmel and Grace became close friends. In late August Grace and Carmel were on the trampoline after having a sleepover at Carmel's house when Carmel slipped and broke her leg. When Grace rushed home to get Connie she discovered her and Jacob kissing. Carmel was admitted to the ED, and when Connie discovered scratches on her stomach she told her that Grace did it. Despite taking the initial blame, Grace eventually admitted the truth to Jacob when he realised it couldn't have been her as she bit her nails. Social services were ultimately called when it transpired that Carmel had been subject to her mother's psychological abuse. In anger, Steph followed Connie and Grace home in the car and tried to get them to pull over on a road which ran on the ledge of a sleep cliff. They eventually reached a corner and Connie was unable to stop the car and they went plummeting off the edge as Steph looked on in horror from her car.

Following the impact, Grace and Connie were thrown from the car, although both in different directions. Connie was distraught when the car exploded, thinking that Grace was inside. Steph later stopped her car and tried to phone for an ambulance after having driven off but she was hit by an oncoming vehicle. When she ended up in the ED Jacob was informed by the paramedics of the damage to her car and he went out to see it with them. He made them drive along the road and they located the site of the crash. Jez noticed that Grace wasn't in the car and they eventually found her and she was suffering from breathing difficulties. Dylan later arrived and suspected Grace had a possible pneumothorax and a flail chest. Iain promised to go with her in the air ambulance after she left a message for Connie on her phone. However, a drone collided with the helicopter and it crashed down outside the ED and Grace sustained new head injuries. Jac Naylor went down to treat Grace after she'd been removed from the helicopter. During a CT scan she started fitting and Duffy suspected the new head injuries. It later transpired that she had sustained a subdural haematoma and the chances of surviving were not good, and Jacob was the one who went to tell Connie.

Behind the scenes

Emily Carey made her first appearance as Grace on Casualty on 29 November 2014 and initially remained on the show for just over a month. She reprised her role midway through series 30 in 2016, and is currently a present recurring character. Her role will continue into series 31, although the character's fate is currently unknown as of the end of the first episode.

Appearances

See also: Character appearances.

Carey made her first appearance as Grace in the series 29 episode "Losing Grip". She remained as a recurring guest character until 2015. In 2016 she appeared along with Sam Strachan (Tom Chambers) in episode 23 of series 30, "Hearts and Flowers", which aired on 13 February 2016. Her role continued through the year. Her appearance in "What Lies Beneath" was uncredited. In recent appearances, she's been credited as "Grace Beauchamp-Strachan".