Three Promises To Pete

Written By Tracey Roberts

Whilst Pete, lay in his ICU hospital bed for over 4 months connected to the only thing keeping him alive, a ventilator we had plenty of time to chat during my daily visits. Among them were three hefty promises made to my dying uncle.

  1. Lift awareness on paralysis.

  2. Fix the wheelchair problem at Royal North Shore Hospital.

  3. Find a cure for paralysis.

Whilst I had no idea where to start, having been personally exposed to such enormous issues I knew I had a responsibility to get on and do something about it.

1.      In 2012, less than two years after my uncles passing, I released my first book, ‘The Will To Live, The Courage to Die’, and thought I could comfortably tick off my first promise.

Next issue at hand was to fix the wheelchair problem at the hospital. Given I wasn’t a registered charity, a friend suggested I take my recently published book and pitch the associated problem to my local Rotary Club. They finally agreed to send a member out to the hospital, where we were given access to a small room filled with broken wheelchairs. Rotary eventually agreed to help put together a much bigger fund raiser than anticipated, The Blue Diamond Ball.

2.      An astonishing $128,000 was raised on the night which enabled us to purchase several chairs for the hospital as well as having the existing chairs repaired.

Next is the most anticipated promise of all, find a cure for paralysis!

Having been invited to become a member of the Perry Cross Spinal Research Foundation back in 2014 I’ve had the honour of working with the remarkable Perry at the helm, and an incredible team of people who work tirelessly to raise funds for research. And none more exciting than what we are seeing coming out of Brisbane’s Griffith University where they are about to embark on the first human clinical trials this year.

We are so much closer to finding a much-needed cure for individuals suffering with spinal injury that I’ve come to realise is it’s not about ticking off three promises for Pete it’s a journey of a lifetime and one I’ve only just begun… 

Tracey Roberts

Tracey Roberts is a Sydney based retired Art Dealer, Writer and Author of, ‘The Will to Live, the Courage to Die,’ a non-fiction inspirational biography about her uncle who lived as a ventilated quadriplegic.

Following her books release in 2012, Tracey went on to conduct a major fundraiser titled the ‘Blue Diamond Ball’ in 2013 and successfully raised over AU $128,000 for high-tech wheelchairs for Sydney’s North Shore Hospital.

Tracey was awarded Drummoyne Woman of the Year as part of the 2014 NSW Women of the Year Awards for her book’s legacy and fundraising.

That same year Tracey was invited to become a member of Perry Cross’s Spinal Research Foundation and happily accepted. Like many, her dream is to one day find a much-needed cure for paralysis and as part of her work she is dedicated to seeing that dream become a reality in her lifetime and ultimately fulfill her promise to her uncle.

Her new book ‘Paralysed’ is a romance novel which touches on various forms of paralysis, both physical and emotional, showing that it was possible for her lead character Vanessa to overcome both.

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