Team A C Wilgar Fundraising Challenge

We are taking on the challenge of raising over £5000 for Bromley, Lewisham & Greenwich (BLG) Mind, through fundraising activities with all of our workforce and customers!

A C Wilgar Plumbing and Heating are a family business based in Orpington and Beckenham, offering services within the Kent and South East London areas, and BLG Mind is a part of our local community. 

Liam Wilgar explains why they have chosen to support BLG Mind....

“The Wilgar family have always struggled with mental health issues, but we never knew it until 7 years ago, when my mum, Tina, was diagnosed with bipolar disorder. My mum was a fantastic role model to 5 kids, so her weird moods and bouts of tiredness were always shrugged off as the side effects of intense parenting, but when mental health started to surface as an “acceptable” topic of conversation I recognised that my Mum needed help for different reasons. Mum's response to the diagnosis was pure relief – finally, an explanation for the way she had been feeling and thinking.

Fast forward 1 year and my youngest brother, Tom, suddenly disappeared one evening. Tom had been acting very strangely for several weeks, even for an 18-year-old! It transpired he had developed psychosis, a terrible mental illness that has taken hundreds of young lives, and something that has only really been recognised in the last decade. Tom has no recollection of what happened but to say we are lucky to still have Tom with us is an understatement. Mind were the first people on the end of the phone when both Tina and Tom needed them, and we cannot stress what a difference they made then, and ever since.

My mum has since passed away and we miss her every day, but Tom is getting better and I'm pleased to say is a long way down a long road to full recovery after 5 years.

As a family one positive thing we can say is that mental illness, for all the terrifying and terrible things it has caused, it has brought us closer together than we ever would have been without it.

A.C. Wilgar are delighted to be working with BLG Mind, a fantastic organisation, and one that quite literally helped to save Tom’s life."

BLG Mind works alongside people with mental health needs and dementia, to improve their quality of life. The money raised by A.C. Wilgar will help BLG Mind continue to work alongside these extraordinary people!