When I was 10 years old, I went on a family holiday to Arran in Scotland. It was cold (about 8 degrees, give or take), rainy and I didn't want to climb a bloody 400-metre mountain. And so - as my family and the poor family friends they had dragged along will confirm - I did the only sensible thing. I lay down in the heather. And I screamed.

So obviously it makes sense that now, aged 24, I'm planning to scale a slightly higher mountain - 5,071 metres higher, to be exact. It's likely to be a tad colder (temperatures can fall to -20 degrees celsius), a tad wetter (freak storms can appear out of nowhere) and rather a lot further away from the cosy, peaty fires of Scotland and the pumping central heating of London.

I'm climbing Kilimanjaro.

And it's all for the Foundation for the Study of Infant Deaths.

FSID funds study into Sudden Infant Death Syndrome - also called cot death. It supports bereaved families and tries to get more information out there to stop more cot deaths from happening.

It is a hugely important charity, not just to mothers, families and babies all over the country, but also more specifically to my family.

A year before I was born, my mum had a son who died - Thomas. While I was growing up, my hyperactive imagination used to fantasise about what he would have been like. I envisaged someone really good at maths so he could help me with my homework, but also someone with a great imagination, someone really funny, really good at playing make-believe games with me. Then he became someone who liked the same geeky films, but who also managed to be really cool and attractive with loads of FITTIE friends...

Mum and Dad never found out why Thomas died when he was only two months old - many parents don't. But since then, in a huge part thanks to FSID, cot deaths have reduced dramatically. Money has gone into research and more and more people know how best to put their babies to sleep to reduce the risk of death. FSID has also worked with bereaved families - like mine. They talk to parents who are going through what for most people is unimaginable grief at losing a child. And they help parents if they think they want to have another baby.

And they want to do more. By 2015, FSID aims to reduce the number of unexplained cot deaths to less than 200 (it is currently around 290 per year) and halve it to 150 by 2020 - as well as still supporting all those parents who really need the charity's help.

So perhaps that explains why I'm going to be clumping around in my walking boots at work for the next few weeks (gotta break 'em in), why I keep dashing off to the gym (TRAINING!), and why I'll be heading to Tanzania on March 14...

So please - PLEASE - donate whatever you can! 

Oh and... 

YOU ARE NOT PAYING FOR ME TO GO ON HOLIDAY! 

I've paid for the tour costs (thank you, money saved living at home for 5 months!) so every penny you donate will go to FSID!

So dig deep and help me climb verrrry high (and possibly get a bit high off the lack of oxygen at 5,894 metres) - it's for Tom and for FSID.

Click here to read more about FSID