My gap year travelling, meeting children in Cambodia and Vietnam, inspired me to want to help children in need. Working for Parents for Children, and then TACT (The Adolescent and Children’s Trust) opened my eyes to the need to help the children on our doorstep in the UK. Specifically, children and young people in care who, through no fault of their own, find themselves unwanted, unloved and in need of a family. There are around 65,000 children in care in the UK. Over 60% will have suffered abuse or neglect. Baby P would have ended up in the care system if he hadn’t sadly died from the abuse and neglect that he suffered.

 

So why the crazy idea to climb a mountain? Well, the idea came about one day in the office when two other colleagues returned from cycling from London to Paris, full of the buzz of a challenge and fundraising for TACT. So, Karis and I decided we wanted to do a similar challenge. We agreed that cycling and running weren’t our talents….but, we could walk right?! So why not trek to the top of Mt Kilimanjaro? If Cheryl Cole and Chris Moyles can do it then so can we! So that’s how it all started. After setting ourselves the challenge and looking into how we would go about it, we attracted a friend ‘France’ into our group too. Now there are a few of us planning to reach the peak of Mt Kilimanjaro in February 2012, for the plight of children in care.

 

So…why sponsor me?

 

Meet Elisha and Courtney.

 

Follow this link to read Elisha’s story, 17 years Old. Elisha’s mum placed her in care when she was just a one month old baby. In 11 years Elisha had 37 mums, experienced abusive placements and attended 30 different schools, before finally finding happiness with her current carers through TACT.

 

Courtney, aged 7 years said this about her TACT foster carers: “They [my TACT foster carers] make sure I am happy. If I want to talk about anything they listen and help. […] I wish I could have come to foster care earlier.” Courtney, TACT Young Person 2009.

 

Elisha and Courtney’s experience with TACT carers prove that care can be a positive experience.

 

Help me to help them. Sponsor my courage to climb Mt Kilimanjaro. However small or big a donation, your money will go a long way and will change a child’s life for good.

 

Your money will help TACT to find stable and supportive families for vulnerable children in care across the UK. Help to give them a chance in life, some happy childhood memories like yours and mine, and a positive care experience like Elisha and Courtney eventually had.

 

It’s also a huge personal challenge for me. Those of you, who know me well, know that I’m not very ‘sporty’ and I’ve never really stuck to a rigorous fitness regime, apart from horse-riding all those years ago and a bit of yoga here and there! So, this is a challenge of a lifetime for me, where I will be pushing myself to the extremes and facing the unknown, like vulnerable children in the UK do every waking day…If not for my courage to climb a mountain then sponsor me for being deprived of manicuring my nails for 10 days in Tanzania up a mountain!!

 

I will keep you updated with my training and fundraising.

 

Thanks for all your support!

 

Charlotte x

 

P.s. Join our Facebook group People DIE up there!!!

 

"Ay, to the proof; as mountains are for winds, That shake not, though they blow perpetually." - William Shakespeare Taming of the Shrew, Act II, Scene I. Click here for more climbing mountain quotes.