Wheely good news as fund to buy new wheelchair for Wimblington man Wills Storey hits £15,700

A family who launched an appeal to help their disabled son be more independent with a state-of-the-art wheelchair have been overwhelmed by public support.

Just four months since Kay Storey launched the Will's Wheels appeal the family are already more than half-way to their target with £15,783.31 in the fund.

Kay, from Wimblington, set up the Wills' Wheels Gofundme page at the end of February with the aim of raising around £30,000 for a new chair for her son William 23.

Organisations and individuals alike have responded generously to help Wills, as he likes to be known, buy the wheelchair that will help him enjoy more freedom, including the ability to stand up.

Wills who was born prematurely at 26 weeks weighing less than the proverbial bag of sugar at just 1lb 11.5 ounces has cerebral palsy, which has left him confined to a wheelchair..

Earlier this year he tried a new wheelchair that, unlike his current one, will allow to stand up.

When the appeal was launched it had a target of nearly £30,000 but Kay has since been told by the wheelchair company that she will not have to pay VAT and so the target has dropped to around £24,000, which means the family are well over half-way.

Kay said: “We have been completely overwhelmed by people’s generosity. Organisations have held all kinds of events including the Golden Lion at Stonea which had a family fun day and raised over £3,000. The Three Tuns at Doddington has had a couple of afternoon teas and so have the Welly Wearers, and I’m just waiting for that money to come in.

“Wills is very excited and keeps saying ‘it’s getting there’, he just can’t wait to get the new chair. It will make life so much better for him.”

There are a number of upcoming events including a family fun day at the Anchor Pub in Wimblington on July 28 from 12pm when there will be a host of activities and also a grand draw with prizes that include a family holiday to Haven in Mablethorpe, a family ticket to Woburn Safari Park and family day out to Santa Pod.

“All the prizes have been donated for the raffle and some of them are amazing, again people have been so generous, we really can’t say thank-you enough for all the support Wills has received,” said Kay, who added: “The other weekend there were dozens of people taking part in a zumabathon - they did three hours of zumba in all that heat.”

Tesco in March is planning a fundraising day on September 1 which will include bag packing.

"There are honestly some really, really nice people. I was a bit worried when we launched the appeal, but we have had nothing but good wishes from everyone. We are just so grateful for all the support so far," concluded Kay.

At the time the appeal was launched Wills explained why the new chair would mean so much for him.

He said: “This wheelchair lets me stand up, which means I can stand up whenever I want or need to. Can you imagine it, this would be brilliant. As for the last two years I have been working on standing up with a machine but I can only do this with help of other people.

“This wheelchair would mean I wouldn’t need any help. OMG this chair can move when standing up.

“Also it can lay flat and can move up and down like a changing bench so I wouldn’t have to lay on the floor in disabled toilets to have my needs met. This really does mean such a lot for me. I wouldn’t get any more sores from sitting down all the time.

“You really don’t know how much more independent I would be. Lots to explore. The wheelchair is a Permobile F5 Corpus VS.”

To help Wills achieve his dream visit: https://www.gofundme.com/will039s-wheels