On 2 March 2013, MS Society volunteer Jo Hardiman was awarded the MS Young Inspiration Award at the Oxford MS research day.
Jo was given the award for her work setting up and organising MSsy (pronounced like "messy") – a group for young people with MS, as well as for her ongoing support for younger people with MS in the Oxford area.
Jo was diagnosed with MS in 2006, and despite knowing about support groups available in her area, at first she didn’t want to meet other people with MS. It wasn’t until 2008 that she decided to go to the MS Society West Oxfordshire branch’s physiotherapy group. At the group she met people she had things in common with, but she found that she was the youngest in the group. Jo says, “I now look at a lot of those people as friends, but at the time, I felt that there was something missing. I felt someone needed to create a group for younger people with MS.” So, Jo decided to do just that.
In September 2010, the first meeting of MSsy took place. MSsy is an informal group that meets monthly. Every other month MSsy meets in a pub in Oxford, and on the other months they do a variety of activities, like going for meals, bowling, greyhound racing and barbeques, as well as a Christmas get together. “The group was supposed to be bi-monthly” Jo explains, “but there was so much demand it ended up becoming monthly meetings!”.
Jo says of winning the award, “I still feel like it is all a dream. I can’t get my head around it. It feels like such an honour that people find me inspirational.”
Inspirational and modest too. Congratulations to Jo for her incredible and very well deserved award!
