Fundraising
From the moment of Rory's diagnosis, we have been offered invaluable support from many fantastic charities. We'd love you to consider giving to any cancer charities or charities supporting sick children, but especially the three we've decided to focus our efforts on at the moment. These are Young Lives vs Cancer, The Grand Appeal (Bristol Children's Hospital Charity) and the Children's Cancer and Leukaemia Group.
We have set up funds in Rory's name with all three of these charities. If you'd like to give to any of these, please click on the charity's logo below.
To see a full calendar of who's doing fundraising events when, please click here. If you'd like to organise your own event, please get in touch - we'd love to hear from you!
Click on the logos below to give to that charity on rory's behalf
thank you!
Young Lives vs Cancer are a cancer support charity who aim to help limit the damage that a cancer diagnosis inflicts on the lives of young people and their families. They have been present since the very beginning of Rory’s diagnosis and continue to help us find our way through the process as parents, including sourcing grant funding to make up for lost earnings and providing nursing care at home to reduce trips to hospital. They also cover unexpected funeral costs and go above and beyond for grieving families. Their support and guidance is making Rory’s diagnosis, hospital journey and death a far less lonely and terrifying experience.
The Children's Cancer and Leukaemia Group (CCLG) are responsible for valuable research behind treatment for childhood cancers like Rory's and the advancement of our understanding of the disease. Alongside this, CCLG provide loads of helpful information for the whole family with regards to specific cancers and what the treatment process might look like. Any donations to Rory's CCLG fund will go towards researching medulloblastoma. You can visit Rory's CCLG hub on their website here.
The Grand Appeal have been the funding force behind most of Rory's treatment, especially the equipment that made his brain surgery so advanced, successful and, most importantly, safe. They do amazing things to support both patients and families in Bristol Children's Hospital. They fund everything from tea and coffee for families to state-of-the-art surgical equipment to Reiki sessions for patients and parents to bereavement support. Any money raised through Rory's Grand Appeal fund will be split between neurosurgery and oncology.
and if you aren't in a position to donate, there are other things you can do...
Give blood!
Rory had over 70 life-saving blood products transfused while he was in BRHC. If you can, it really is a brilliant gift to so many lives. Please do consider giving platelets too - Rory's also had a lot of those and they are in short supply. It's almost the same process as giving blood. It's also really easy to register yourself as a stem cell donor.
Join the stem cell register
It's ridiculously easy to join and you could quite simply save a life. We spent a lot of time around parents desperately waiting for a donor match. It only takes one, it could be you!
Give your time.
Most charities have volunteering opportunities for people from all walks of life, or you could arrange a sponsored event - the charities above give loads of ideas. We have an umbrella fund on JustGiving for these, so if you want to link an event to Rory's page specifically then let us know :)
Buy lovely things direct from the charities. As well as lots of cool, own-brand products, lots of charities sell non-branded gifts and things too. CLIC Sargent have a great shop on their website here, The Grand Appeal here and CCLG here. We also have our own Etsy shop selling cards for we've designed, raising money for CLIC Sargent here.
We also have our own Etsy shop selling cards we've designed that fill a gap in the market for to the point sympathy and encouragement cards. Raising money for Young Lives vs Cancer here.
We all have our own opinions about Amazon, but if you do shop with them, shop with AmazonSmile here. It's just like Amazon, but Amazon will donate 0.5% of eligible purchases to your chosen charity. All three of the above charities are registered with AmazonSmile. Make sure you enable smile on the mobile app too!
Value our NHS, look after your health, and give your loved ones regular hugs!