On the 17th August I am taking part in the superhero triathlon in Dorney Park London. This is to raise money for the Lily foundation. This is one of the mitochondria Charities. In my opinion mitochondria is one of the lesser known conditions. I suffer from Mitochondria myopathy. There are many types of mitochondria, mine is one of the more rare ones!

The condition gets worse as one gets older. I was in a car accident when I was aged 5 which left me partially paralysed, brain damaged and partially sighted. So things to do with the mitochondria may have got worse quicker due to things that were weaker because of the car accident, I had to rely on other mito affected bits that have got weaker sooner than otherwise expected.

So I am in a wheelchair as well as not been able to see too well. And suffer with fatigue, this means I don’t have as much energy.

When I do the triathlon this year, I have 2 helpers on the day. Sara who used to work for the Jubilee Sailing Trust. I sailed on one of the JST’s Tall ship back in 2016. Sara was one of the crew members. She has helped me every time I have done the triathlon!

Over the years for the last 14 years on and off I have been wheelchair skiing with Disability Snow Sports UK. Clarice who is also helping me had skied with me on 2 different years when in Andorra and Austria!

I really need Clarice and Sara’s help as I can’t see too far in front of me at any one point.

We need to get the fact that over 10,000 people suffer from Mitochondria in the UK out there.

Whenever I go for my check ups at Newcastle RVI where they look after our condition I often say that I try to do as much as possible to keep my condition from deteriorating. I am sure from the first year I did the triathlon back in 2017– now my condition is a little worse. I am sure it may be even worse than it is at the moment if I hadn’t kept doing as many activities as I have done over the last 7 years.

At present I go canoeing in my local area and am active doing physio to try to strengthen muscles that haven’t already been affected by the mitochondria disease.

This year maybe especially tough due to a recent injury that occurred during an annual trip skiing where I suffered a knee injury

Through doing the triathlon I am hoping to raise money to help aid more research into treatments and cures into the condition