Gemma's Exercise Equipment

Hi, my name is Andrew.

I am reaching out to all of you amazing people to raise funds to purchase some exercise equipment for our little superstar, Gemma, who was born with "wieacker wolff syndrome", a very rare severe X-linked recessive neurodevelopmental disorder affecting the central and peripheral nervous systems. It is characterized by onset of muscle weakness in utero (fetal akinesia), which results in arthrogryposis multiplex congenita (AMC) apparent at birth.

Gemma goes to a special needs school who are doing the best they can to support her with her education and physical needs. She loves going to school and is very popular among her peers, pupils and staff because she is such a happy girl with a bubbly personality. Gemma can't get from the car to her class in the morning (and back again in the afternoon) without getting or giving at least ten hugs!

Gemma is becoming a teenager now and her hormones are starting to play a bigger role in her life which is impacting her body. Gemma struggles to lose weight because she is unable to move like the rest of us and with her recent operation to re-seat her hip bone into the hip socket, movement is even more limited.

It is extremely important to get Gemma into an exercise programme that helps improve her fitness and general well-being and because of her needs, it is simply best to do this at home where we have spent all of our money to convert it to provide her with enough space to wheel around safely and easily by widening doors and replacing carpets with hard flooring, converting an attached area on the ground floor into a bedroom with an attached bathroom/wetroom with special equipment and a hoisting system so that we can move her around safely and position her just right in her bed and wheelchair. Besides, we have not found any suitable institutes in our area that offer any form of exercise facilities that match Gemma's needs.

The funds will be used to purchase a passive-active exercise machine called a "THERA-Trainer leg and upper body trainer tigo" and any accessories such as software and grip bars for hands and legs that she may require to provide the best fit for her body and position in the wheelchair. These machines are pretty expensive, ranging between £5,000.00 and £8,500.00 as base models, once you add the accessories such as cuffs for therapy grips (hands), leg protection and foot fixations and the software for pc or tv the price jumps by another £1,500.00 to £2,500.00. We simply cannot afford to pay for this ourselves as the home conversion has used up all of our resources.

Your donations will change Gemma's life... any help will be highly appreciated!

Sincerely,

Andrew.