Wheelchair appeal smashes target in a week

A man with a rare and life-limiting condition has raised the £5,000 he needed for a new lightweight wheelchair in just a week.

Corey Haseley from Telford said the donations had been "beyond belief" and told the hundreds of people who supported him: "You are going to change my life."

The 31-year-old has been told he is the only person in the world to have Optic Atrophy Plus Syndrome Mitochondrial Disease. He was not expected to live beyond the age of 19.

It is a condition which has left him blind and suffering from fatigue, muscle spasms, epilepsy and needing medication for pain and he said: "With the time I will have left with this condition, that chair is going to be everything to me."

Haseley had been told he had to raise the money he needed for the new wheelchair in three months, to take advantage of a grant from Telford Wheelchair Services.

The total has already passed £6,000 and he said that included one donation of £400.

"We actually personally messaged them, like we have a lot of people, to double check they meant to pay that amount in," he said.

The new lightweight wheelchair was needed because he is becoming increasingly fatigued and is finding it harder to push his current one.

The new one will also have a bucket seat, to stop him slipping around and to help with his posture.

Any money left over will be saved for future alterations and he said: "People don't realise how much this equipment is."

A new cushion for a wheelchair could cost £800, he said, tyres could cost £600 and new wheels could cost £1,250.

Haseley spoke to the Wolverhampton-based manufacturer, Invictus Active, on Tuesday to place his order and is just waiting for the money to come through from his GoFundMe page.

He was told it could take between six and eight weeks to build. Once it arrives he has invited his backers to come and meet him.

"Thank you from the very bottom of my heart," he said, "The independence I will get from it is unbelievable."

He said the chair, and any excess money the appeal generates, was going to put his "life in order".

"I can live my life," he said.

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