May 18, 2023, was the day I was going to become my own hero –I was going to be the first Australian with multiple sclerosis (MS) to climb to the summit of Mount Everest. But on May 17, this dream derailed.
The first suggestion that I might have MS came in 2008, just after the birth of my third child. My official diagnosis came a decade later, and with it, my quest to fulfil my childhood dream and be a mountaineer. As a mother, a woman with MS, an educator and someone who wants to be a positive role model, I realised I had to make a commitment to rise above the challenges I was facing.
So, in early 2023, I
