More details revealed at funeral of Cooper Steele’s last days

The devastated loved ones of Cooper Steele farewelled a promising young man on Friday, and shared stories of the challenge he’d faced with courage, warmth and generosity.

The devastated loved ones of Cooper Steele farewelled a promising young man on Friday, and shared stories of the challenge he’d faced with courage, warmth and generosity.

More details of the medical condition which beset Cooper Steele throughout his life, and the valiant actions of his partner which gave his loved ones an additional three precious weeks with him, were revealed in a moving funeral service on Friday.

Cooper died while sleeping at his Brisbane apartment on Friday, October 13, with the coroner’s investigation into his cause of death still ongoing, although staff have assured Cooper’s family that he went peacefully.

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Speaking at the service at Bundaberg’s Branyan Gardens chapel on Friday, Cooper’s father, Gavin Steele, said the coroner’s investigation could take up to another four months, with staff advising that the cause of death may never be determined.

Cooper's father, Gavin Steele, gave further insight into the health condition with which his son had been battling throughout his life.

In his speech Mr Steele gave further insight into the chronic migraines from which Cooper suffered throughout his life, a hereditary condition he shared with Vicki and other members of his extended family.

In his early years, Cooper would experience one or two migraines per year, the most severe of which resulted in a loss of vision, numbness on one side of his body, and slurred speech, which increased to the point of one per week when in his final year of high school.

Through the past year Cooper began experiencing the yet-unexplained medical issues where he would wake up with a paralysed limb, which triggered an extended hospital stay.

Testing for multiple sclerosis, MRI and CT scans found two shiny spots on Cooper’s brain, not unusual for migraine sufferers, and he was referred to see a neurosurgeon on October 31.

Around two weeks before this appointment, Cooper’s girlfriend, Elissa, woke up at 3am and saw Cooper passed out on the bathroom floor.

Cooper's partner, Ellisa, saved his life after finding him lying on the bathroom floor of the apartment they shared in Brisbane.

With the bathroom door locked, Elissa took a knife from the kitchen and cut through the fly screen of the external window to the bathroom, and climbed through the window to find Cooper not breathing and turning purple.

Elissa performed CPR on Cooper while the ambulance was en route which revived him, saving his life.

“We’ll be forever indebted to Elissa for saving his life and giving us three extra precious weeks with him,” Mr Steele said, choking back tears.

Elissa was the first of Cooper’s loved ones to speak at the service, giving a heartrending eulogy to the “funniest, smartest and most confident person” she had ever met.

“He had the biggest heart,” she said.

“He loved me, his family and mine and every one of his friends with everything that he had and more than anything in this world.

“Although I will never accept that you’re gone, I will accept that I’ll be living without you until I take my last breath and will be reunited with you in the stars.”

Family and friends laid flower petals and bush leaves by Cooper’s coffin before filing out of the chapel.

In a moving testament to Cooper’s love of family, his sister Madison remembered the times he drove her children to hospital when she was unwell, and turned up to her house with Hungry Jack’s every time he would visit.

“There won’t be a day we won’t think of you Cooper,” she said.

“We love you forever and my kids will know you as their favorite uncle in the sky.”

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After family and friends placed flower petals and bush leaves by Cooper’s coffin, they quietly moved out of the chapel, with some going on to the wake at the Sandhills Bowls Club.

NewsMail offers our heartfelt condolences to Cooper’s loved ones.