Thanks for taking the time to visit my JustGiving page.

Please help me to raise money for Multiple Sclerosis (MS) which is a lifelong condition that affects the brain and spinal cord, and can sometimes cause serious disability. For more information visit the MS website.

Donating through JustGiving is simple, fast and totally secure. Your details are safe with JustGiving - they'll never sell them on or send unwanted emails. Once you donate, they'll send your money directly to the charity. So it's the most efficient way to donate - saving time and cutting costs for the charity.

EVERYONE HAS A STORY - THIS IS MINE

I want to the world to know that my Mum - Carol Marshall existed. She was kind, brave and gentle and MS robbed her of a rich and joyful life.

Being born to a Mum who had MS and ended up being severely disabled by it, is why I want to raise money and awareness of the disease, in a creative and personal way because it is all I have ever known and is something that has impacted my whole life. My Mum, Carol Marshall was diagnosed at the tender age of 19 whilst in the joyful throes of preparing to marry my Dad on her 19th birthday in 1971. I was born 4 years later despite being advised by a Dr not to go through with the pregnancy as they knew so little about MS in general let alone how a 2nd pregnancy after my brother’s difficult birth 2 years previously, might impact someone with MS. This was the mid-seventies, in the backwater of North Cornwall. There was no help, no advice, no support; so as a family we simply muddled through. From day one I learned, that high emotions be they laughter or tears, would "make Mum more wobbly/make Mum worse", to put the needs of others first. Consequently, I bottled things up, a survival mechanism that has allowed me to cope but is no longer serving me which is another primary motivation for this Challenge.

Thankfully things have changed massively since then and we know a lot more about MS, how to treat it and also how to support those with it as well as their loved ones. With your help we can keep these vital support services open and continue the research into MS.

£10 could pay for two phone conversations with a trained member of our MS Helpline as part of the MS new Keep in Touch service.

£50 can help someone struggling with MS access an MS Nurse to get vital support, wherever they live and without having to leave their home.

£350 could pay for one person to receive a full six session counselling course to reduce stress, anxiety and depression

So how am I going to raise money for MS? Well, this would have been Mum’s 70th birthday year (sadly she passed suddenly and unexpectedly aged 63 years young in 2016) so I am going to fulfil 70 Challenges/activities between now and her birthday on 18th September 2023!! I want to honour her, honour myself to be the best that I can be, and to make her proud. When I decided to do this Challenge last year, I started to work on them but I have not yet gone public because my biggest challenge is to explain WHY I am doing this which is deeply personal and painful, so I have been putting it off! Then, my Dad passed away suddenly which took the wind out of my sails for a bit, so I have given myself until the end of 2023 to complete these Challenges now. Please check out my Instagram account pip.ms.70.challenge and Facebook page to see what I have achieved so far!

Each challenge/activity has been selected to remind me of who Mum was as a person; to celebrate her and all the things that she enjoyed but MS made impossible for much of her life. I hope that this process will both bring me closer to her and help me to finally come to terms with how painful it has been to watch my Mum go through all she went through and to see her suffer all my life.

I hope too I am reminded of who she was in a way that MS sadly denied me in the raft or care duties I had to undertake (Dad left when I was 15, thrusting me into the role of carer) - Dr’s, nurses, social services, hospital appointments and so on...I simply forgot to remember the person beneath the heavy veil of MS. As MS (and a particular set of circumstance, including my brother who became absent, due to his own suffering) reduced Mum’s life to very little - the last 15 years living alone, housebound, needing to be hoisted in/out of bed, in/out of her chair or her wheelchair to move about her house, with just one trip out a week to go grocery shopping; this challenge will also let the world know that my courageous and beautiful, kind-hearted Mum - Carol Marshall, existed.

THE CHALLENGE CATEGORIES:

I will post about my Challenges on my Instagram account pip.ms.70challenge and Facebook page as and when I am working towards them. They are many and varied and will fall into these three categories:

NATURE & CORNWALL, anything PENGUINS! - Mum grew up in the Cornish countryside, and loved the beauty of Cornwall and it is a crushing sadness to me that she couldn’t enjoy it so easily in adulthood. She also had a total love for Penguins!

MOVEMENT - having witnessed a life curtailed by not being able to move, I want to celebrate the joy of movement which is something most of us take for granted.

HOBBIES - crafting, baking, art, and anything Royal Family! Mum loved all of these, but it became harder and harder to do things as MS progressed.

THE 6 BIG CHALLENGES

My #1 Challenge will be an ongoing 'blog' on my Instagram page, explaining the reason behind ‘70 Challenges’, and my thoughts/feelings as they surface through doing them. I intend to open up about my experience as a child of an MS suffer, in a way that I have never done so before.

#2 HANG GLIDING: Mum always wanted to ‘fly like a bird' (please note the name of the company I will be doing this with here. Talk about Serendipity!). I am quietly terrified by this prospect!

#3 SING IN PUBLIC: Mum always loved hearing me sing. Equally terrified!

#4 SWIM & CYCLE RIVER CAMEL (20K CYCLE, 9km SWIM) : Mum grew up alongside the River Camel, when the Steam Trains ran from Bodmin to Padstow (now the Camel Trail), and I grew up in Wadebridge which is also alongside the Camel. So I want to cycle and swim the length of it from Wenford to Padstow as it literally links us both together. Mum is also responsible for sorting out swimming lessons when I was about 7 and ferrying me back and forth when I started to compete. Swimming always makes me feel close to Mum as I consider it a gift that she gave to me. Exhausted just thinking about doing this!

#5 SPENDING TIME IN THE CHAPEL (now a cottage) MUM & DAD MARRIED IN: this was the tiny Methodist Chapel that Mum went to every week for Sunday School in her childhood. They were the only people to marry there and had to gain a special license to do so. I want to make a special trip to stay there and see a part of Mum’s life through her eyes, and to feel close to both parents. ACHIEVED OCTOBER 2022 - check out my Facebook & Instagram page pip.ms.70 challenge

#6 20K MS WALK: An organised event in either in London or Cardiff

I appreciate that purses are tight at the moment, so if you cannot afford to sponsor me, then please do share the links with all your friends far and wide. I value any support I may receive that will help me to keep going, just as much as any donations. Please also note that any challenges that require me to spend money will be paid for by myself and won’t come out of the money that is donated.

Please don't forget to follow me (and share), there may be a challenge or activity that inspires you to sponsor me Facebook or pip.ms.70challenge

Thank you