I must be mad! (but you all know that!). On the 11th July I will be abseiling down from the top of the i360 tower in Brighton!! Why? Because I really want to help Matilda keep walking into adulthood.

Matilda is the eldest daughter of my friend Lindsay. Matilda has cerebal palsy which affects her legs, hands and mobility. While Matilda has had numerous surgeries over her life to improve her mobility, as she approaches her 14th birthday there is now a limited amount of time within the natural growth period for final surgeries to take place in order to set her up for life so she can keep her mobility and most importantly, her independence going into her adult life. No 13 year old girl should have to worry about losing their mobility later in life. Despite this, she remains extremely positive and still manages to keep up with her friends by walking short distances, but often uses a wheelchair and kaye walker too.

Matilda would so love to keep up with her friends but walking hurts to do because her hamstrings have bad spasticity meaning they're tight and painful all the time. This makes Matilda walk with a crouch which causes more problems for her hips and back. Then on top of that, her balance and posture are affected which can cause Tilly to fall over causing her knees to be constantly cut and bruised.

To quote Tilly : ‘ {I am} just in so so much pain with all this I'm missing out on life because I can't join in to the best of my ability, I can't sleep because of pain and have to take medicines to relax my muscles so I can sleep. Not much fun for a girl my age.’

To set Matilda up in the best way for adult life and to keep her walking independently, she needs to have surgery on her hamstrings in order to lengthen them, to help stop the pain, relieve pressure from her back by reducing her ‘crouch’ and most importantly - to keep her walking. She has already embarked on growth plate surgery earlier this year to again, relieve pressure on her back and to help align her hips to allow her to walk even the shortest of distances without her kaye walker.

The reason I am fundraising is to help Matilda and her family towards the cost to go back to a private doctor in America, who successfully carried out previous surgeries, which have improved her CP massively and to keep Matilda walking.