This is a solo swim challenge in honour of my grandmother, she had an amazing life and today, 24th May, she would have been 88 years old.

She died on 20th August 2020 with very advanced Alzheimer’s after having recovered from Covid, this was during the peak of the pandemic in Brazil and she was buried without any family and we could not fulfil her burial wishes.

For a while I have been wanting to do an awareness/fundraiser in her memory and given that there are 88 days between her birthday and her death, why not swim 88km?

So that’s the plan!

Is it a challenge? Well totally! I have never done that distance in such a short period of time, I haven’t done any serious consistent swimming for years now so I’m excited and dreading!

Why dreading it? I had a near-drowning experience when I was little. It was only in my late teens that I decided that I needed to overcome the experience. For years I could only swim backstroke as I couldn’t stand the feeling of the water on my face.

Inspired by a friend doing the London Triathlon, in my early thirties already, I decided that I wanted to give it go only find out that you cannot swim backstroke in a race!! I was so determined that I joined a club and slowly managed to quieten the panicky feelings.

Since then, I have done many triathlons in pool and open water.

I have done freediving and am a scuba dive instructor.

The irrational fear is always there, I bring it into the foreground every time I’m in the water. My love for the marine environment and teaching can normally keep it at bay.

Over the 88 days I will share some information about Alzheimer’s disease that hopefully will be useful to people.

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Alzheimer’s Research UK

Our vision is a world where people are free from the fear, harm and heartbreak of dementia.

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