Hey everyone!

My birthday is on the 17th April this year and for a while i have been thinking about a charity that I want to support. This year I am asking for donations to a wonderful charity called 'The Wren Project. '

The past few years I have been battling chronic illness. My whole life was suddenly consumed by the constant feeling of exhaustion and feeling unwell. I have lost the person I once was who loved to travel and see new places. Now it's a journey in itself to just survive a working week. I personally have an Autoimmune disease called Hashimotos Thyroiditis. It's a condition where my body attacks my thyroid everyday. There's literally a whole battle going on in my body daily and you probably wouldn't know it by just looking at me. It truly is so hard to reach the realisation that your former self is no longer here. Dealing with the diagnosis and build up for me was extremely challenging. It started with 'we need to urgently test you for cancer' to 'you have this forever invisible illness that never goes away.' I remember in the past thinking, well at least cancer has treatment! What now!

A lot of people that have Auto Immune Diseases face dismissal from doctor after doctor. It becomes such a battle to be heard that you even start to think you might be crazy! Then after a whole lot of fighting for answers the answers are the reality that you're just never getting better. I came across 'The Wren Project' one day on google. I think I typed in something like 'support for those with auto immune diseases. ' Honestly, when searching that, things had hit rock bottom for me. I remember I was crying whilst turning to a google search for just anything. I thought to myself, i can't do this alone, there must be something anything that can help. Going through symptoms everyday and trying to exist around people who will never understand it is so hard. That's why when I found out that the Wren Project offer one on one talking services I honestly felt a bit of hope. Ok, maybe I CAN get through this, i'm not alone, there is help!

It started with a short chat with a lovely lady called phoebe who was so understanding. It then lead me to meet Shadab. She sat with me for weeks listening to my woes and helped me through more than she truly knows! We talked about so many different things that it was really giving me the best kind of outlet. It was the one place i felt like i could talk without judgement and be heard. When speaking to others about my illness, i felt guilty, like i was bringing people down. Shadab never made me feel like that once and she was honestly amazing the entire way through.

My point is, without them, I would have felt even more alone. I honestly cannot thank them enough and that's why it's really important for me to help put some money together to give back and help others that will need their assistance in the future. Also, the door is open for me to to go back which is amazing and makes me feel so much comfort. My journey with chronic illness still isn't over as we're looking into the possibility that something else is also going on. But, I know they will always be there for me and that makes me so happy.

If you can spare anything at all, it would mean the absolute world to me. If you're not in a position to donate then I kindly ask you share this on so someone else could help.

Thanks for reading :)