Pals take plunge for MS charity

When Kayte Giblin was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis, she was determined to do something to raise money for charity.

So she has signed up for a sponsored skydive – and roped in her best friend Carlie Smith to join her.

The pair will do the jump for the Multiple Sclerosis Trust.

While they are looking forward to smashing their fundraising target of £1,000, they are not exactly counting down the days to the jump.

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"I'm quite scared," said Kayte. "At first I was all, 'Yeah! Let's do it!' and now I'm getting pretty worried.

"I've never done anything like this before and there's not much you can do to prepare for it."

Kayte, 29, who lives in Wigston, was diagnosed with MS two years ago.

It is a chronic degenerative disease that destroys the nerve fibres in the brain and spinal cord.

Most days she is fine, apart from a little clumsiness, but she knows that later in life the disease will have a big impact.

She said: "I had my first attack a few years ago, although I didn't know what it was at the time.

"I had just got back from the V Festival and I was getting double vision. I'd been up for a few days and thought it might have been that."

After several trips to hospital, an optician and her GP, Kayte finally got taken seriously.

She said: "The hospital just kept saying it would sort itself out and it did.

"But then the next time I had an attack it was different – like someone had suddenly turned the contrast knob on a telly.

"I had brain scans and a lumbar puncture and I was finally diagnosed.

"Since then I've been wanting to do something for the MS Trust but I've got two kids, aged four and eight, and I'm a student, doing journalism at De Montfort University, so it's taken me a while to organise anything.

"I saw the MS Trust was organising the skydive so I thought me and Carlie should sign up for that."

Kayte and Carlie, who have been best friends since they were seven, are due to leap from a plane at 10,000ft at an airfield near Nottingham on June 17.

Carlie, 30, of Cosby, said: "I'm honestly petrified. We probably could have picked a less scary way of raising the money, like a sponsored silence.

"In fact, I think people would have been really happy for Kayte and me to do a sponsored silence!

"At least it's for a good cause and with a bit of luck we can get much more than £1,000."

To sponsor Carlie and Kayte search for "Kayte Giblin" at:

http://uk.virginmoney giving.com/giving/