“When I got home, I felt relaxed and I just felt complete.”
Pinkie's Story
Back in February 2022, Storm Eunice created havoc when it tore across the UK leaving a trail of devastation. But for one family from Stourbridge, nothing was going to get in the way of them enjoying their first holiday in ten years.
As the storm raged outside, single parent Pinkie and her two children snuggled up in a warm spacious caravan at Regent Bay Holiday Park in Morecambe and watched DVDs together. Ten-year-old Leah had never stayed in a caravan before. “I liked it a lot,” she says.
The last decade has been challenging for Pinkie. She lost her partner eight years ago when Leah was still very small and her son only nine. In the interim, she’s experienced health issues that have led to mobility problems and she now walks with the aid of a stick.
Then in March 2020 along came the pandemic which saw the three of them cooped up in a confined space for months on end. And as if all that wasn’t enough to contend with, Leah is currently being assessed for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).
So a break away from the day-to-day routine was exactly what Pinkie and her children needed to reset after so much hardship. But a holiday wasn’t something that was within their financial reach which is where Family Holiday Charity stepped in.
The family was referred to the charity by Dudley Young Carers because of the role that the children play in looking after their mum.
“Mum has got some severe physical issues,” advisor Tracey Dalloway explains, “and she’s not had the courage to go away. This has been brilliant for her to attempt it and to get out there, she thoroughly enjoyed it.” As Pinkie says:
This holiday was a break for us, to get away from normal life really. It was absolutely fantastic, it filled us with excitement and was something that would have been unachievable for us to have done on our own.
Having never been to a beach before, top of Leah’s things to do while away was to feel the sand between her fingers and paddle in the sea, despite the cold.
The adventure didn’t end there. Keen to make the most of every minute of the holiday, both children tried kayaking for the first time. They also tried go-karting, bowling, swimming and trampolining. No corner of the caravan park went unexplored, from the arcades to the Showbar with its nightly entertainment.
For Pinkie, the best bit was seeing her children spending time together despite their age difference.
I was just ecstatic at seeing my kids have such a fun time.
Leah has fond memories of the food in the Boathouse restaurant: “It was yummy, we ate onion rings and chicken nuggets!” As well as the trip to the beach, her holiday highlight involved beating her older brother at bowling.
“To other families considering going away, I would say go for it,” she concludes, “because you’ll gain a whole world of experience and it’ll be better for your life.”
According to Pinkie: “When I got home, I felt relaxed and I just felt complete that we’d done a family holiday which was on our wish list to do.”
Hopefully, we can have another holiday soon. I’m trying to save up because it gave us the break we needed, and it brought us together as a family.