85-year-old great grandmother from Surrey celebrates birthday by skydiving to raise money for charity

Today (18th August), great grandmother Terri Collins from Surrey is celebrating her 85th birthday by skydiving for charity.

Terri is diving from 15 thousand feet in Salisbury, to raise money for a local mental health charity that she set up.

Remarkably, this is not the first time that Terri has done this recently. She did the exact same thing for her 80th birthday, I asked her what she was expecting to be different this time around.

"The actual jump, I can remember how cold it was. I hadn't expected it to be cold, so I'm going to put lots of layers on this time and it because it was all happening, it happened so quickly and I hope that this time maybe it'll be in slower motion so I can take in the views."

Terri also brushed off any idea that the dive was at all going to be scary.

"Well, it isn't really because I'm strapped to somebody who is very fit and does it as a profession and health and safety are very, very strict and and it's not often you get strapped to a very fit young man and dive off a plane"

Terri Collins was quick to show appreciation for her friends and family

"Oh, the support network is is amazing. I mean the counselling partnership themselves and everybody is rooting for me, which is lovely. I have four children. I have 5 grandchildren and one great grandchild and they're all going to be supporting it."

The Counselling Partnership provides, accessible, professional one-to-one counselling services for adults.

Terri currently operates as the chair of the charity and says that funding for mental services like hers are needed now more than ever.

"At the moment the I think lots of charities, but particularly our charity are having difficulty raising funds because a lot of the the money for mental health charities is directed to young people"

However, Terri says that she thinks the message she can send is more important than the funds that she's raising

"I'm hoping actually that the sending the message is going to be the most important feature of of me doing the dive

I think one in five adults in England now have a common mental health condition, and the NHS waiting lists are huge

This jump is my way of showing that no matter your age, you can make a difference, mental health support should never be out of reach."

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