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I have taken part in many swims, including competitive disabled swimming. However, one of my goals was to swim the English Channel, then St. James's Place Wealth Management asked for
volunteers to take part in a relay. I immediately applied and was one of the lucky ones to be accepted. It was a massive opportunity, for a
brilliant cause, the St. James's Place Foundation Trust.  Unfortunately,
due to Covid I wasn't able to take part however, I decided to replace this swim with an even bigger personal challenge. After long discussions with Ceri, my friend and open water swimming coach, we are planning to attempt to swim Windermere, Ullswater and Coniston end to end all in 24 hours. This is a total of 23 miles!! We are kindly being supported by Bob from the ''Adventure Swimming Coach'' who is helping with logistics and the support boat on the day.

The Foundation is a charitable arm of St. James's Place Wealth Management Group and has raised and distributed over
£90 million to help make a significant difference to the lives of children and young people. The Foundation supports hundreds of charities under the following themes, Cherishing the Children, Combatting Cancer and Supporting Hospices. As you can see, it is a very worthy cause, more information can be found at www.davidmakin.co.uk.

I began my swimming journey at an early age and thoroughly enjoyed it. Like most people though, I switched and changed the exercise type I did, but then, when I was 28, when my second daughter was born, I was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis (MS).

Life was never going to be the same for myself and my young family. I didn't know what was round the corner, how slowly (or quickly) my condition would affect me (or them), if I would be able to cope, even if they would cope with me. Life was definitely in the unknown and to a great extent, it still is. MS affects my mobility, emotions and speech, due to the damage points on my brain and spine, but it is still an
'invisible' illness, making it hard for people to understand, because they can't always 'see'.

This is when I went back to swimming, as it was the only form of exercise I could do, where I didn't have my body working against me. MS affects people in many ways, for me it is a constant feeling of what I can only describe as 'pins and needles' throughout my whole body, plus the MS Hug, which meant I had to retrain how to breath during swimming, which in turn affected my technique. Thanks to KJ and now Ceri from the Aquatic Body I am a stronger, more focused swimmer.

Ceri’s Story

I’ve been asked by numerous people over the last few weeks ‘what inspired me to come up with such a crazy challenge’ so here’s the reason why… bear with me it’s a bit of a long one….

Originally Dave should have swum a channel relay to raise funds for The Foundation however, due to Covid, this was unable to proceed so I thought, what could we do in this country that would be epic and inspire likeminded swimmers as well as raising funds for the Foundation that support many charities including Children with Cancer…. A cause very close to my heart because…When I was 7 years old I showed my Mum some lumps that I could feel on my neck and my left shoulder… she immediately took me to the Doctors but they were baffled…After a year of investigations a specialist from London called Dr. Briggs diagnosed me with a Fibrous Histiocytoma…. Basically at the time a very rare type of cancer, especially in children. I was actually only the 7th person in the world to be diagnosed with this form of cancer. My parents were told that without an operation I would die however an operation was risky and would only give a 50% survival rate…. Can you imagine. If they consented to the operation and I survived my upper body would be paralysed on my left side… it must have been terrifying but of course they consented and I went under the knife. The operation was a success and I survived with paralysis to my left arm and my head kind of hung to one side a bit but I was alive and could now begin the long road to recovery.

Much to everyone’s surprise over time my left side responded and I was able to move it and use it a little more each month…. Then one night I fell out of bed… the top bunk and both my arms went out to save me…. I woke Mum and Dad up at 4am by bouncing on their bed waving my arms in the air 

Needless to say I had many years of treatments and check-ups to follow and if I feel any lumps anywhere… even now I am rushed into hospital for them to be removed…. But I am hugely grateful to be here and be able to attempt something as crazy as this challenge so now it’s time to give back…

If you can spare anything… £1… it will go towards supporting this amazing charity and hopefully help other parents having to face these awful decisions…

If you got this far… thank you for reading and supporting us 

Thank you all for your continued support and I will keep you updated on our training progress. Hopefully this time the Covid rules will not affect our swim.

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