This Children In Need day…

When you watch Children In Need do you wish that you could do more?

Do you see those little faces and wish you could change their lives today?

Because I know two little girls who need your help.

Ava and Abbigail need their mum back.

She is there, in the house. But she isn’t in the garden. She isn’t taking them to school, or the park, or a café. She didn’t take them out at Halloween and she will not be able to take them to see Santa.

Yet their mum is there. But trapped in the house due to the lack of a working, and suitable powered wheelchair.

Fi Anderson is a strong, independent, passionate lady who happens to have Muscular Dystrophy and uses a powered wheelchair. The right chair enables her to be the full time mum, adventurer and primary carer for her two girls who have always seen her as “just mum”, because that is who she is.

But, unfortunately, the powered wheelchairs provided by the NHS often don’t meet the needs of those with more complex physical support needs. If you can’t adjust your position, you need a chair which can do it for you. Many people with Muscular Dystrophy need a chair which can recline, tilt or lay flat. And, when you are a parent, you need to be able to reach the high shelves to keep medication out of reach of small children. NHS provision does not often meet these needs.

Fi has had a poorly suited powered chair for a long time. It didn’t meet all her needs and has been breaking for years. It has broken down when out so many times that Fi started being unable to risk being out with her children without another adult. She stopped being able to pick them up from school in case her chair broke down and she couldn’t get there.

And she smiled through, and made the best of it, trying not to let her girls see it as a bad thing, just another part of the adventure.

But now her chair will not even hold a charge. She can’t rely on it enough to leave the house. So she is housebound.

Imagine the pain of being unable to care for your children just because you don’t have a wheelchair.

Imagine the pain of not being able to take your children out because you cannot leave the house, because your wheelchair will break down.

Imagine not being able to take your children to see Santa, just because your chair is broken.

Fi has kind friends who will take her children, and who will take photos so that Fi can see their smiles. And Fi will try so hard to hide her heartbreak at not being in those photos with her beautiful girls. Because she is an incredible mum.

But her girls know. And they miss their mum being in those photos and memories too.

Children in Need is a fabulous charity which does so much, but I know that a lot of people prefer to use these days to help a specific individual so that they know their money is put to use straight away. And we really can help Ava and Abbigail right now.

Every donation towards their mum’s new powered wheelchair is a small step closer to them getting their mum back.

Please donate here if you can.

Help get this family back together in their photos and memories.