Swimming for Parkinson's – My Journey, My Mission

Yesterday we pressed the go button on the team with really only one opportunity left this season to get it done. i had done the hard yards over 510km swimming in the past year and nearly 100km covered in the past 8 weeks. I had been feeling slightly unwell the past couple of days but was committed to giving it my best shot. We took off at around 3.15 am from the boat ramp at Braxmere Lodge in the pitch black and calm conditions. Things went well for the first hour i was getting into a nice rythym that felt maintainable for a long period of time. After an hour we had the first feed and time felt like it was going quicker than some of my training swims. After the feed conditions felt like it had changed as we got further out in the lake and it started getting lumpy and I was being thrown into the boat by the chop. The wind kept getting stronger and I was struggling in the less buoyant water of the lake and washing machine like conditions to get a proper rhythm going. Phil suggested it may only last a short while and encouraged me to keep swimming for 30 minutes in the hope it would flatten off again. I was swallowing water and that was making me throw up. I had a sore throat that may have been part of the illness I had been feeling, Unfortunately things didn't get better and we made decision to abandon and was the right call as conditions only got worse. Not the result I wanted but proud of the journey to get there. Thanks everyone who donated to the cause.