On Monday evening, Kirsty W, Year 8, was awarded the Child of Courage award at the Pride of Britain ceremony in London. She was recognised for raising more than £250,000 over the course of the last two years for children's cancer charities, all while receiving chemotherapy for her own brain tumour. Kirsty shared her account of this incredible experience with us.
'Those were the craziest, busiest, most exciting days of my life! There are so many highlights. I walked the red carpet, did loads of interviews, met loads of celebrities, and most of them already seemed to know about me. George Clarke, Steve Backshall, Tim Peake, Rachel and Stephen from 'The Traitors', Jack Grealish and many more. They had surprised me with the award at a recording of 'The Masked Singer' a couple of weeks ago, so of course Davina McCall was there too, on the same table as the Prime Minister! But one highlight was meeting the other winners with my family at a dinner the night before. There were so many amazing people, including a five-year-old called Gregor from Orkney who had taught himself to walk when doctors said he never would, and Dr Eli Prior, who helped to save people's lives in a train crash, even though she was badly injured.
'The day after, we were all invited to 10 Downing Street to meet the PM (again!) I got the chance to talk to him, and his lovely wife Marie-France, about the need to do much more research, much faster, because the options for brain tumours are still horrible, and limited, as I can say from experience.
'And then, on Wednesday, me and my family went on 'This Morning' to explain about my new project, which is to find KirstyQueens. Anyone can do it, you just donate any amount monthly: £2, £5, £10, you decide. And then you become a Queen! Every penny will go on research projects. I have 168 Queens right now but I'd love to get to 500. And soon I'll be visiting the Institute of Cancer Research, to talk with my charity, OSCAR's Paediatric Brain Tumour Charity, and the scientists, about where that money should be spent. I gave two of my crochet creations to the presenters on TV, so they had to say yes! But I felt OK about it, because straight afterwards they surprised me by giving me tickets for Olivia Rodrigo – my mum couldn't get them when she tried last month!
'Please do support me and my new challenge: go to www.mynameiskirsty.com to sign up.' Kirsty W, 8Y Well done Kirsty! We couldn't be prouder of you. The Pride of Britain awards was screened last night, Thursday 22nd October, on ITV. If you would like to see the programme, it is now available to view on ITVX. A recent BBC article about Kirsty's campaign can also be accessed here.