In the summer of 2021 my 15yr old son Christopher came into Stokers for an eye test. He was complaining of headaches so we did a 3-D retinal scan on his eyes. This showed he had severely high blood pressure and he was rushed into hospital where he was diagnosed with Chronic Kidney Disease (CKD).

After a month of medications and hospital visits he went into complete kidney failure and was again rushed into hospital for an operation to enable him to have life saving dialysis. Myself and my husband Paul underwent weeks of training to enable us to do dialysis at home, which we then did for the next 12 months, every other day for 7 hours.

We also had tests to see if we could donate one of our kidneys to Christopher.

Paul was found to be a good match and on 9th Feb 2023 they had the transplant operation.

Through-out this whole journey our family’s been on, the NHS doctors and Nurses have been amazing. The care we’ve received has been second to none – what these people do is incredible.

With that in mind and in view of how Chris was diagnosed, everyone at Stokers (they’ve all been through it with me!) wanted to give something back to our local kidney charity Kidneys for Life, whilst raising awareness of the need for us all (young and old) to have regular eye examinations.

As the first part of our fundraising journey we will be walking 23 Miles, on 6th of August, along the 9 edges from Derwent Edge to Birchen Edge and would love it if any of you could sponsor us – it’ll probably kill me!!! So anything you can give would be much appreciated.

https://peakdistrictwalks.net/9-edges-walk-challenge-peak-district/

Abi, Paul and Chris West, and all The Team at Stokers