Hi. I’m Louise, and I live in Mississauga, Ontario.

I love volunteering on Patient and Family Advisory Committees for Trillium Health Partners, running an annual charity event for MitoCanada, working on my coin collection, and doing aquafit. My faith, loving family and friends are all important to me. I feel blessed that my 2 adult children are unaffected by mito. They have all rallied around me, encouraging me, helping me, and picking me up on those low days. I have an amazing support system!

I am so overjoyed to have MitoCanada in my life for many reasons. I believe in the work they do to help raise awareness and funds for research and education. This organization understands what I’m going through and how hard life gets sometimes. I have a personal connection with quite a few members of the board of directors, and I cherish them.
In 2015, I participated in a walk for mito and it hit me that I was the only one walking the 2.5km who had mito. Others were either being pushed in a wheelchair, or family members were walking in memory of their loved ones. When I finally finished, I was 40 min behind everyone else, and all the finishers were still there to cheer me on. The encouragement was so inspiring!
I can’t walk that distance now; however, after that year, I decided to raise awareness in my own community. I started Walk’nRoll 4 Mito in 2015 because it gives me a purpose to focus on what I can do, and I’m excited to see that it has since gone national. The support I have received from MitoCanada has been encouraging and kept me going, especially during the tough times. I want to show that doing something is better than nothing, and the more you push yourself, the better you will feel. Exercise is medicine, especially with mito disorders. Even though I can’t walk 2.5 km, I do what I can. I find that an hour in the water doing aquafit is most beneficial to me.
In 2015, when I started the Walk’nRoll, my sister Rita (who also had mito) was being pushed in a wheelchair. Rita lost her battle to mito and since 2018, the walk has been in memory of Rita and all the ones we have lost too soon to this disease.

I’m passionate about raising awareness and funds for research because it would have made a difference in my life and my sister Rita’s. I began having symptoms at the age of 8 but was not correctly diagnosed with mito until I was 18 years old. There is a huge advantage with early testing, diagnosis and education.

My vision for MitoCanada is that we would be able to get an early diagnosis so treatment can begin right away, to continue with mitochondrial transplantation research and testing and eventually find a cure.

As for me, I’ll keep fighting. I know that I have mito, but mito does not have me