Powell River’s Dietrich family will be huffing and puffing in Vancouver later this month, climbing stairs as part of a campaign to raise funds for BC Lung Association.
As participants in Climb the Wall, the Stairclimb for Clean Air, the Dietrichs, including mother Nancy, father Gary and sister and brother Megan and Jeremy, will be climbing 48 flights of stairs at Sheraton Vancouver Wall Centre to raise money for lung health.
“It makes people gasp,” said Nancy of the multi-storey event. “[The lung association’s] slogan is, ‘When you can’t breathe, nothing else matters,’ and the event really makes you think about that.”
This will the family’s eighth time participating in the event, which has personal significance for Nancy. Her sister suffered from severe asthma.
“She would stand at the end of my bed and wheeze at me,” said Nancy. “That’s all she could do to let me know she needed help. I would get my mother and we would end up in emergency.”
The climbing team, named Graceland Grinders after the Dietrichs’ Powell Lake cabin, will be joined by a group of expatriate Powell Riverites, which in the past has included Jennifer Zroback and Kimberly Diprose-Balfour.
“It’s fun to do the event in a team,” said Nancy. “One year we had about 12 people from Powell River.”
Nancy said her family has raised about $600 for this year’s event so far, although she has yet to go door to door to ask for donations.
“Each person on the team should raise about $120,” she said, “although we usually raise the money collectively.”
In training for the event, Nancy said she has been doing squats to prepare her legs for the ordeal, although she can’t say the same about all members of her family.
“I’ve been doing squats, but my husband will be hopeless,” she said. “Your legs start burning by the 33rd floor, so you really have to prepare.”
For more information, go to stairclimb.ca.
