My Mount Everest Challenge

I was watching a special on TV about a 13 year old boy who just summited Mount Everest. This created a light bulb of a fundraising idea for me. I decided that I too will climb Mount Everest. Unfortunately with my condition I can't actually travel to the Himilayas but I can do the equivalent here in my stairwell. Upon researching the climbing of Mount Everest I found out that on average it takes 21 days of actual climbing to summit the mountain. This is when I realized this was the perfect fundraising effort because it has so much symmetry with my disease (almost all of my treatment cycles last 21 days). Mount Everest is a total of 8850m high so for me to complete this task I will need to climb the stairs in my building 8.5 times per day. This equates to climbing 161 flights of stairs each day for 21 days straight.

When I spoke about getting active everyday this is one of the reasons why. I will need to build up a great deal of strength to achieve this goal. Yesterday I rollerbladed for 40 minutes and today I climbed 55 flights of stairs. Although I still don't have the strength to complete this goal I am continually building up the strength to achieve it. It will be a long journey to get there but will be so rewarding when I do. Due to the heat of the summer I won't be attempting this goal for awhile because the stairwells will be too hot to complete. Plus I need to build up the actual strength to achieve it. I am not sure if this is even feasible while going through my treatments or if I am going to have to wait until I am done treatment but I will keep you all updated ;)

I really like this fundraising idea because it will take a lot of will and determination to complete. Much the same that a blood cancer patient has to have to complete their treatments. Also it is much different than other forms of fundraising because they usually only last a couple hours. I would love this to eventually become an annual event where others complete it and fundraise with me but for now we will see how year 1 goes ;) I will keep you all updated on my progress and let you know when I am thinking of doing it. First I have to build up my daily physical output :D

I hope you all have a wonderful weekend and we shall talk soon,

Aaron