Community centre walk to support Grace and Tommy
By Aimee Walsh
A LOCAL Youth and Community Centre are organising a “walk for awareness” to raise money for two children that were recently diagnosed with a rare mitochondrial disorder.
As reported recently in The Echo, Tommy (5) and his little sister Grace (4) Dickson were diagnosed with a rare Mitochondrial disorder within six months of each other - and are two of three known cases of this type of metabolic disease in Ireland.
Sandra, Anna, Brian, Stephen, Sean, Karen and Darren from Brookfield Youth and Community Centre (inset) Tommy and Grace
Sandra Lambert, manager of Brookfield Youth and Community Centre in Tallaght says that they decided to organise the walk as Grace and Tommy’s dad Kevin is a colleague at Foróige and they wanted to do what they could to help.
“We are not fundraising in the traditional sense. What we are trying to do is walk for awareness so that people will donate to the GoFundMe page.
“If people want to donate to the GoFundMe page – that’s what we are hoping for. We have got balloons and banners with the GoFundMe page on them and if we are walking somebody might take notice and go onto the page,” Sandra explains.
The walk will take place on Friday, June 11 and will start at Brookfield Youth and Community Centre. Due to Covid-19 health and safety measures, anyone that would like to take part are asked to arrive anytime between 10am and 6pm to ensure there are not large groups.
“The idea is they come here, grab their balloon and we have two routes and they can choose whichever route they want and then ideally come back with the balloon and tell us how many kilometres they have walked and we will clock the kilometres for Grace and Tommy,” explained Sandra.
To learn more or to support the Dickson family visit Memories for Grace and Tommy on GoFundMe.
