Join the Bluestack Challenge walk to support Donegal town based Bluestack Foundation

People in Donegal are encouraged to join the Bluestack Challenge to help raise money to keep open vital support services for people with special needs and their families.
This annual event is a major fundraiser for the Bluestack Foundation. As well as providing crucial services, the foundation owns a centre which is a hub for information and activities.
Manager Wendy McCarry is herself the mother of a child with special needs. She believes the Bluestack Challenge is a way of showing solidarity with parents of people with special needs.
She said: “The whole idea of the challenge is a mirrored effect, that for one day you are walking uphill and you think ‘I can’t go on’ but you do. You keep walking even when your legs are shaking and all you want to do is sit down and cry. You just keep going and eventually there will be a reward, that exhilaration of coming downhill to the finish line.”

Reward
For a special needs parent, that reward is their child reaching a milestone that many other parents take for granted. Ms McCarry’s own daughter Ava took her first steps at the age of 4 ½.
“That day was the most incredible day of my life,” she said. “I celebrated that day and my family and friends celebrated.”
“Ava is non-verbal but the odd time she will say ‘Mummy.’
“That is huge. Nobody can understand that feeling.
“That is how you keep going and that is the idea of the challenge.
Money raised from the challenge will help the Bluestack Foundation continue to provide services, supports at activities in its centre at the Glebe, Donegal Town. There are currently 261 registered families.
“We all need to feel that we belong somewhere,” said Ms McCarry.
“A lot of our children who came into our clubs would have had difficulty adjusting to the group.
“But we have kids that have gone on to Rinka, to Foroige because we create that pattern of social activity.”
The foundation also helps prepare people for work by helping them to adjust to a mainstream environment.
Money raised from the Bluestack Challenge is what allows all of these services and activities to continue.
The walk takes place on June 8, with registration closing on May 18.
Anyone who would like to take part or to find out more can go to www.bluestackfoundati
on.com.