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Why Aspire?


I had taken on the previously mentioned pool equivalent of the Channel for a couple of reasons; the main one being to raise much needed funds for Aspire, the Charity for those living with a spinal cord injury (SCI). I could not believe that 1 person in the UK sustains a SCI every 8 hours. Meaning there are 40000 people living with it in this country alone. There is no funding for them for specialist lightweight wheelchairs, other specialist equipment and adapted housing, that is not deemed ‘essential’ by an already overstretched and underfunded social care system. The charity’s strapline ‘From Injury to Independence’ particularly struck a chord with me, having overcome adversity so many times and facing the challenges of living with a physical impairment on a daily basis.

Another reason was that I had reached the 20th year anniversary of my amputation. Having needed surgery to reconstruct the ligaments in my remaining ankle in December 2015, followed by 5 months in a cast/boot I needed a challenge to get me fit again. I went on to raise £592.30 by completing this Ampuversary Swim. It was filmed by calendar TV and the Head of Marketing for Aspire spoke during the programme and afterwards approached me regarding the possibility of completing an English Channel crossing in Summer 2018. I was very interested and hoped to attend a Selection Day in November 2017. Then only days later came the crushing news that I had aggressive breast cancer, 10 tumours in my left breast and metastases in my lymph nodes.

What followed was chemo, several surgeries, including a mastectomy and reconstruction, then Radiotherapy, infections, sickness, skin grafts, lines in my arm and chest and of course...no swimming 😔 I wasn’t allowed in the water for 10 months! And subsequently the fading of the dream to do the Channel Relay.......or so I thought!

When approached again in October 2017 about the imminent assessment day I was encouraged to still attend but not pressured to do the 400m test swim. I did attend and did the swim but boy was I unfit (not surprisingly!) I had to stop several times and felt I had zero lung capacity!!! A couple of weeks later I found out they took a chance on me and invited me to join a relay team for summer 2018! Eeeek now the hard work was to begin! 

If you are able to support me in my madness it would be greatly appreciated and for a great cause https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/victoria-gilbert2

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