This evening I interviewed Gordon Aikman and his partner Joe Pike. Gordon was Director of Policy for the Better Together Campaign when he was diagnosed with Motor Neurone Disease seven months ago. Motor Neurone Disease is a rare, debilitating and progressive disease. It attacks the nerves which carry messages from the brain and spinal cord to the muscles. It leads to weakness and muscle wasting, meaning that soon, Gordon will be in a wheelchair. Soon, he will struggle to feed himself and even breath. Soon, he will die. There is no cure.
Joe interned at Total Politics and then worked with me at LBC for a couple of years. He and Gordon have known each other since they were at university together but it was only more recently that they got together. They are going to do a regular audio diary for my programme so we can monitor what happens to Gordon and promote awareness of MND.
I knew this was going to be an emotional hour. My great fear was that I would blub and ruin the whole thing. As it turned out I didn’t, even though I think the three of us found the whole thing very emotional.
I hope you find listening to Gordon as inspirational as I did.
If you’d like to donate to his JustGiving page click HERE. His website is HERE. And you can follow Gordon’s diary on his LBC page HERE
