UP CLOSE: With soon-to-be former CEO of Momentum Children's Charity
Bianca Effemey OBE says she had never worked in the charity sector before establishing Momentum Children's Charity in 2004.
Now, after 21 years of building Momentum into the charity it is today, Effemey has decided to step down from her role as CEO of Momentum so that she can retire.
Effemey began her career as a receptionist in the Pediatric Ward at Kingston Hospital after being trained as a nurse when she was younger.
Momentum is a charity which supports families across SW London, Surrey and Sussex whose children are facing cancer or a life-challenging condition.
Effemey came up with the idea to establish Momentum while in her receptionist job where she "met one very special child who had had her mouth ulcerated due to having chemo and she couldn't have any cold drinks or swallow anything".
She said: "So, I wanted to see if we could provide anything that would make life easier for children in the hospital."
The charity CEO then came up with the idea to have a small fridge in one of the isolation rooms which would contain cold drinks or "an ice cream if there was a freezer".
"Anything. Just to make life a bit easier for the parents and for the children," Effemey said. She continued: "So, I went to John Lewis - I had no idea what I was asking for, really – and asked if they have small fridges that could go into an isolation room. And they [John Lewis] suggested that I start up a charity.
"I had no vision of what that would mean. I had already spoken to other parents at Kingston Hospital who had children with cancer.
"Two parents particularly thought the fridge idea was really good.
"So, when John Lewis came up with opening up a charity, I looked completely blank, thinking, 'well, I just want a fridge, I just want a freezer or something'."
Despite not having any knowledge of how to start up a charity, Effemey asked John Lewis how she might do this and the store showed her how.
Effemey said: "It was pretty simple really and John Lewis said 'if you do that, we will give you a freezer or a little fridge for every isolation room at Kingston Hospital'."
The two parents who liked Effemey's fridge idea helped her to start Momentum; one of the parents came up with the name Momentum.
She said: "So, it all started literally around a kitchen fridge."
Effemey had only planned to open the fridge charity for three months -enough time to get the fridge - but "of course, John Lewis came up trumps, the fridges arrived, and it just spiraled from there," she explained.
She continued: "It became something that I'd never dreamt would happen.
"You meet the most amazing families of children with cancer and life limiting conditions.
"You meet the most humbling children whose lives just disappear in front of them for a period, they lose their control, and the parents lose their control.
"So, all you want to do really is to make everything better and easier for them. So, it just spiraled."
Effemey explained that the charity "spiraled" into something bigger than she imagined by having families and children getting on board and giving her ideas, such as boat trips down the Thames and short trips away.
Children would give her ideas about how stays in hospital could be made easier and what support services Momentum could put into place.
She said: "It was never to take over the work of the nurses or the NHS. It was to provide facilities on top of what I felt the NHS really couldn't afford to pay for."
Momentum started off at Kingston Hospital but it now works with nine local hospitals.
"We've changed the hospital environment," says Effemey.
"We've made it easier to access psychology. We've made it easier for children to have home visits so that our wonderful support team can go out to them."
Momentum has a family support team, which visits families at home and in hospital.
The charity also works on hospital wards, which Effemey says is "quite special".
She said: "It's just wonderful to work alongside the NHS rather than against it.
"We work together as a team to make sure that we are all doing the same job and helping people.
"We're not doing NHS workers' jobs, but we help them, and they help us, and they give us the referrals and we help the families at home and within the hospital."
Momentum also has a "large" bereavement team, which looks after families who lose a child.
Effemey says that she has seen Momentum grow in its 21 years and has seen lots of changes in the local hospitals she works with since she worked at Kingston Hospital.
She said: "I think that the changes that have been made within the pediatric ward at Kingston Hospital are phenomenal, and we've tried to do that in a lot of hospitals.
"People always say it's very difficult in hospitals to work with them because of bureaucracy, but actually we've managed to do that, and we've managed to work together and that's been something to be very proud of."
She explained that the key to creating a successful charity is "having the right people on board with you to work with, having trustees that believe in your mission, having hospitals that are open to discussion and helping each other, and having families that trust us and let us share their journeys with them, knowing that we can help in small ways."
Effemey will be leaving her role as Momentum's CEO in six weeks' time and will be passing the baton on to Sarah Woods.
However, she will still be a big part of the charity by becoming a Lifetime President of Momentum.
She also plans to continue working with bereaved families as a celebrant.
Speaking about her time as Momentum's CEO, Effemey said: "It's just been a wonderful 21 years of meeting the best, the strongest, the most amazing people and just being surrounded by a team of people within the office who feel the passion and absolutely get what we're trying to do.
"I've loved it, but I know that there comes a time when you have to hand it over because it becomes more difficult, and you need a fresh face, and you need fresh people.
"So, I'm handing over to Sarah, who will come on board at the beginning of May, and we'll have a month to work together.
"And I just know that she will follow the baton, hand it over, and Momentum will remain as wonderful as it is today."
She says that her proudest moment from her time as Momentum's CEO was receiving an OBE Last year.
"I felt that that wasn't just pride for me. I think that's pride for everybody who's been involved in Momentum because it would never be here if it hadn't been for them.
"And you don't really want the children to be sick to provide a Momentum, but if it hadn't been for the children and the families, I would never have got it.
"And also, for the team, I think I really felt that the OBE was a team thing. We always say that Momentum feels like being part of a family.
"So, I felt that it was for the Momentum families."
The CEO said that her most memorable moment at Momentum was when she met the "first child that ever started this or my memories of that first child because that's what made me do what I do now."
Effemey says that Momentum has "organically grown into something that we now have to make quite a lot of money for".
Thus, the charity needs donations. You can donate to Momentum here.
Momentum is also hosting a gala evening on 4 May for its 21st anniversary with a raffle and it has also launched two auctions and a prize draw, all of which will help raise vital funds to help local families with seriously ill children.
You can bid on the auction prizes or buy a raffle ticket here.
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