Selfless diabetic Sunderland schoolgirl Reenie raises nearly £5,000 for diabetes charity Type 1 Kidz

Reenie's mother, Angela Stoker, explains how her 10-year-old daughter raised nearly £5,000 for charity.

Transcript

00:00Okay then Angela, can you tell me about the netball competition, you and your daughter organised them please?

00:05Yes, so we wanted to raise awareness and raise some funds for Type 1 kids and we're very much netball related

00:12and it was just a second, it was just what we thought would be really well organised.

00:19We've done little tournaments before but not for charity, we do them through the county netball.

00:24The reason we chose netball is it's something where everyone comes together, they're like a family and everybody supports each other.

00:32We've done a festival for over two days, a kids one and an adults one.

00:37We've raised over £4,800 and there's still some funds coming in.

00:41We had local businesses and players, coaches all come together and gave us some raffle prizes which raised a lot of money.

00:51I think the raffle alone raised about over £1,000.

00:54I understand that it's obviously a charity which is very personal to you as well, can you tell me why?

01:03Definitely personal to us.

01:05Rainy was diagnosed about two years in August, she'll have been diagnosed in Portugal.

01:12We were very much alone in Portugal in ICU for ten days.

01:15The language was a barrier, it was really, really difficult and I thought her life had changed forever.

01:20I didn't think she would get back into a netball, into a dancing, anything like that, I thought that was it.

01:24We were medically flew back to Newcastle in an ambulance to Sunderland when she was well enough.

01:32The diabetes team there supported us and Rainy got back to a dancing, a netball, everything that she wanted to do.

01:40Type 1 diabetes support families in trying to be normal so they can speak to people and share their feelings

01:49because it isn't a common thing, so I think the support out there is really good.

01:56They offer events, even meetings, just parents, Zoom sessions, they do inflator boards at the aquatic centre,

02:04they do all sorts just to make sure that kids can relate to other kids.

02:08Obviously part of this is about raising awareness as well, so what are some of the signs that parents should look out for?

02:15Signs is being really thirsty, kids losing weight, wetting the bed on a night, even if it's really warm.

02:25We did the mistake thinking we were in a heatwave and then symptoms were better but we just weren't aware of it.

02:31Get your kids checked out, blood tests will tell you straight away and don't think it's viral because it's not, just keep an eye on it.