My 9 year old son Charlie was diagnosed with ulcerative colitis in early 2021 after a few years of various doctors trying to figure out why he was passing blood on a daily basis.

If you’re not familiar with colitis, in short it’s inflammation of the lower end of the digestive system, including the large bowel and rectum. Nobody knows what causes it and there’s no cure. Basically it’s really rubbish.

He’s never complained about it, even though he knows it is incurable and will unquestionably impact his life in various ways (there are jobs you are legally not allowed to do if you have colitis, for example). Instead he wants to fundraise for Crohn’s & Colitis UK to try and help somehow, which is rad and I’m really proud of him for approaching it this way.

As Charlie loves rock music but has only been to a couple of shows so far I suggested to him maybe we could do a walk around as many London music venues as possible in an afternoon (on a route suitable for his colitis needs, i.e. toilet access). He's into that, so this is our route:

Highbury Garage / The Grace
Union Chapel
Islington Assembly Hall
Slim Jim’s
O2 Academy Islington
Electrowerkz
The Lexington
Water Rats
Scala
Lafayette
Koko
Camden Underworld
Jazz Cafe
Electric Ballroom
Powerhaus
Camden Assembly
Roundhouse
O2 Forum Kentish Town
The Dome / Boston Music Room

It’s about 6 miles in total. We’re aiming to do it on 17 or 24 October depending on weather..

I love Charlie and I’m really proud of him for turning what is a really crap diagnosis into something positive. If you’d like to help him hit his target I would really appreciate it (and so would he!)

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