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Michael Gumbrell

Sponsored walk

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Edited by Michael Gumbrell, Sunday, 24 Sep 2017, 19:54

So today I did a sponsored walk with my mate Steve.

1.5 miles along Southsea sea front.

1.5 miles or 2400 meters, the meters are important, I will come back to that later.

I was not sponsored, Steve was doing the fund raising himself, for the Solent MS Therapy Centre. I was along as his minder, OT, carer, how ever you want to frame it.

So what is the story behind my walk along the seafront with Steve?

Well 3 years ago Steve had a stroke, not a minor one, a full life changing and debilitating one.

Steve died three times in the first 24 hours following his stroke, but each time he was resuscitated he responded. Steve then spend 4 months in the ICU. At the end of the 4 months, Steve's consultant told Lin, his wife, that Steve had lost all use of his right side, lost complete use of his speech and would spend the rest of his life in the agonising neuropathic pain he was experiencing, all day, every day.

Steve was moved to a permanent residential care facility, where he could only lay in bed and cry with agony of the pain he was in. Steve was medicated, but that just meant he slept for 20 hours a day. Steve was there for 8 months, with a daily routine of 20 hours sleeping in bed, and four hours awake to eat and experience the agony of the neuropathic pain in his right side.

That was the first year after having his stroke. His consultant repeated the prognosis that Steve would never talk, move from his bed or be free of the pain again.

Lin was at the end of her wits end by then. I remember very well the day she phoned me at the Solent MS Therapy Centre and told me that she had been looking on the internet about Hyperbaric oxygen Treatment, that we did it at the Centre, and would we see Steve, even though he did not have MS (Multiple Sclerosis). That was the first time I had spoken to Lin, she did not know me and I think I threw her a bit when I said, 'yeah bring  him down, we can try'.

Bringing Steve down was not easy for his first 2 months of sessions, he had to come in an ambulance, on his medical bed and could only do external oxygen therapy ( not the Hyper baric part, that requires going into a pressure vessel, and Steve's bed would not fit through the pressure door).

But after a couple of months Steve did very well, Lin got to the point where he could come in a taxi, not the ambulance, and could sit outside in a chair for the hour session. Steve also started to become a lot more vocal, at first, from nothing, he progressed to yes,yes and no,no.

A couple of more months of oxygen, once a week, on the outside of the chamber and Steve started to weight bear on his right leg, more words entered back into his vocab and the pain was subsiding.

At that point Lin, Steve and I thought it would be good for him to try a session inside the Hyperbaric chamber. So Steve did a session inside, from that point he just shot along in leaps and bounds, he started to see Katie, one of the neurophysio's at the centre and Simon, the Centre's Shitatsuist. I was rather pleased the day he walked out of Katie's treatment room and walked 20 meters along the centre, so pleased was I that I did him a sticker for his fridge to celebrate walking 20 meters.

Steve persisted, coming to the centre every week to do oxygen and physio. Lin also persisted, she got Steve a FES system to help trigger his right leg when walking, and Steve just got his head down, did his rehab and progressed. The Portsmouth stroke group got Steve some speech therapy, and Steve really started to get many more words back in his vocab.

Steve progressed beyond the walking 20 meters thing, I remember the first time he appeared at the front doors of the centre with a big grin, my first thought was 'crap Steve does not have appointment today, so I asked him where Lin was so I could tell her she must of got the treatment days mixed up, Steve had the last laugh, and the biggest laugh, when I asked him where Lin was, he replied, 'at home'. He had walked from his house to the centre, half a mile away, just because he wanted to do it. Lin appeared in floods of tears about 10 minutes later...Steve had not told Lin he was going for a walk!

Steve walked to the centre a lot during spring and summer, Lin would follow along 10 minutes behind him. He even walked home too.

Steve decided he wanted to do a sponsored walk, so I set it up, got him a tee-shirt and made all the arrangements. About six months ago Steve had a follow up with his consultant, the same one that had given the never walk talk or live without pain news a year before. I think the consultant got quite a shock when Steve walked into his office, sat down and told the consultant to 'fuck off'. As Lin tells it, the consultant was fine with Steve's little show of character, he was just delighted that Steve has done so well.

Steve had a party, which Lin organised fantastically, last month to 'celebrate' the third anniversary of his stroke. It was a lovely party on a Sunday afternoon, there was cake, songs and yes, Steve gave a speech.

And today Steve did his sponsored walk along Southsea Seafront to raise money for the Solent MS Therapy Centre. 2400 meters, I did not do him a sticker this time, it felt like it would have been patronising if I did. Steve has raised £1000, and has become an inspiration to me, his family, everyone who visits the Solent MS Therapy Centre and to all the service users of the Portsmouth Stroke group, many of who now also attend the Centre.

I took this picture half way along on our walk, behind Steve is the statue for the Marines who yomped (Marine speak for walked) across the Falkland islands. One inspirational man stood next to a statue remembering many inspirational men.

The most amazing part of the day was two fold, Steve walks with a FES sensor and control box, his gait can be a little slow, we set aside 2 hours to complete the 2400 meter walk, he stunned me by doing it in 45 minutes! We chatted the whole way along, talked about the cricket, the weather and the joys of a wind swept walk along the sea front, when Steve got to the finish line at the Rose Gardens (in 45 minutes), a tape was broken , fuss made and photo's taken. Steve didn't stop there though, he wanted to walk around the Rose gardens, so I walked around with him. He pointed out the red and orange roses and then stopped, Steve asked me 'what colour does red and orange make?' I knew better than to answer, Steve wanted to pull the answer out of his memory and say it. So I let him think for a minute and he told me:

'Red and orange make crimson'

I just said to Steve,

'yes, yes'

So here's to Steve, who made a journey today and has much more journey to come.

I give you Steve, an inspirational bloke of Portsmouth.


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Michael Gumbrell

Sources of inspiration

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I am off to do a sponsored walk today. 1.5 miles. Easy enoigh for me to do, but a challange for Steve who is doing it with me.

Rather than tempt fate, i will do a longer blog post about once we have finished, at teatime today, and all had hopefully gone well.

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Michael Gumbrell

where did the summer go

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Hope you all had a good summer.

Mine was okay. I changed jobs in August, so i did not get a summer holiday.

I get get to go to Berlin with my son, to celebrate his 18th birthday. That was a great trip.

Berlin is a beautiful city. Here is a picture of us at the Reichstag dome.

as well as that trip, I also abseiled down the spinnaker tower to raise funds for the Solent MS Therapy Centre.

This is me 315 feet, 103 metre's up the tower.

I got 79% for my DD211 exam, so a overall OES score of 79%.

So a 2:1 score so far.

Now here I am, it is September again and time for fire up for my third module.

This time round it is A222- Philosophy.

Let the fun begin, and more blogging, now that we are back to study.

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Michael Gumbrell

Todays the day

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Today is the abseil day. 315 feet or 103 meters down the Spinaker tower.

I have been leant a go pro to record the abseil from my safety helmet.

So the will be a film of me doing it.

Should be fun.

Thank you to everyone who has sponsored me.

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Michael Gumbrell

First 5 days of sponsorship

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Edited by Michael Gumbrell, Sunday, 7 May 2017, 15:55

Thank you to everyone who has sponsored me so far in my 'what goes UP, must come DOWN challenge.

5 days into fundraising I have raised 54% of my target, the target was £ 500 and so far people have been kind enough to sponsor me for £ 265.

This is the link to my page if you want to sponsor me, thank you for the kindness if you do:

https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/michael-gumbrell4

I bought some new walking boots this morning, ready for my march up mount Snowdon. that gives me two weeks to wear the boots in before I walk up the mountain in them.

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Michael Gumbrell

counting down the hours

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I have about 8 hours of study left in block 5. The last block, block 6 is revision for the exam, so very much the home straight now. I will have to write my TMA5 a week early because of my fundraising excursion to climb mount Snowdon the following week.

So time to stop procrastinating and get on with wrapping block 5 up....

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Michael Gumbrell

What goes UP must come DOWN

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What goes UP must come DOWN.

Which is me, i have to now squeeze my TMA 5 in 7 days before the cut off date because i will being doing something else on deadline day.

On Wednesday 19th of April i will be climbing up Mount Snowdon.

This will be the UP part of my challenge, and on Sunday 28th of May i will be abseiling DOWN the Spinaker Tower ( 103 meter's or 315 feet). all to raise funds for my chosen charity.

Here is the link to my just giving page, it would be wonderful if any of my fellow students could sponsor me to complete this challenge,

https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/michael-gumbrell4


Thats the UP.

This is the DOWN


and this is who i am fund raising for,


your support would be very much appreciated,

Mike

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