I was born and raised on the lovely, sunny island of Aruba in Southern Caribbean; which isn’t where you would typically foster dreams of travelling to anywhere cold for a prolonged period of time.

As a little girl I dreamt of being an explorer looking for lost tombs and pyramids from ancient Egypt and spent many an afternoon scouring through my family’s encyclopaedias reading up on the great discoveries that had been made in the early 20th century.

I was never the sporty kind in school growing up and lacked hand eye coordination so I was always picked last on my classmates teams when it came to playing baseball, volleyball, or basketball but really enjoyed track…until I fell flat on my face whilst attempting the long jump in front of my entire middle school….talk about absolute humiliation! So there went my hope of becoming an Olympic athlete.

I went to University in Canada where I truly fell in love with the great outdoors and long treks in the countryside. I learnt how to snow shoe, tried out cross-country skiing, and discovered the joys of tobogganing and white water rafting.

After University I spent 3 years at home in Aruba. Although it was initially challenging to transition from absolute autonomy to being back with my parents, I settled into a typical quiet islander routine of working, hanging out with friends, going to the beach as much as I could and spending an inordinate amount of time in the gym preparing to participate in a local fitness competition.

In June 2008, I moved to the UK and lead a fairly healthy and active life until late 2013 when I suddenly fell inexplicably ill. Unbeknownst to me I had contracted Lyme Disease and my quality of life was severely affected until I was diagnosed with Lyme Disease in the summer of 2016. 

Once I had recuperated I knew I wanted to do something to raise awareness on the seriousness of misdiagnosis and how it can affect every area of life. I knew I had the choice between becoming angry and embittered at the system which had missed the tell tale signs of the disease or the choice to speak of up for the untold number of patients who were suffering unnecessarily. So when Doug Stoup came to our office to talk about his life as an explorer I knew that skiing to the South Pole would be the perfect way to raise awareness. What could be a better opportunity to showcase how with proper diagnosis and treatment I could go from extreme fatigue to pushing my body to its physiological and fitness limits in what has to be one of the world’s most inhospitable environments.

To say I’m super excited and also a little bit nervous about this is a massive understatement. To be able to represent Aruba and be the first Aruban woman to attempt such a feat is an honour and I hope to inspire people to aim high, dream big, work hard, and never settle for someone else’s interpretation of what you can achieve.