![\"Robyn](\"https:\/\/img.resized.co\/breaking-news\/eyJkYXRhIjoie1widXJsXCI6XCJodHRwczpcXFwvXFxcL2ltYWdlLmFzc2V0cy5wcmVzc2Fzc29jaWF0aW9uLmlvXFxcL3YyXFxcL2ltYWdlXFxcL3Byb2R1Y3Rpb25cXFwvYzI4ZGM4MzJlMGI3NDNmYmRmNGNiYzY5NjFiM2M4MjFZMjl1ZEdWdWRITmxZWEpqYUdGd2FTd3hOelkyTlRjME5UTTFcXFwvMi44Mjg4MDMwNi5qcGc_dz02NDBcIixcIndpZHRoXCI6XCI2NDBcIixcImhlaWdodFwiOlwiNDI3XCIsXCJkZWZhdWx0XCI6XCJodHRwczpcXFwvXFxcL3d3dy5icmVha2luZ25ld3MuaWVcXFwvaVxcXC9ibi1ub2ltYWdlLnBuZ1wiLFwib3B0aW9uc1wiOntcIm91dHB1dFwiOlwiYXZpZlwiLFwicXVhbGl0eVwiOlwiNTVcIn19IiwiaGFzaCI6ImNiNjBiNzNkOTZjOWQ5YmVhZDUwZDFkNjRlMmYyMDIzNWU1MjU1YmIifQ==\/woman-walks-300-000-steps-to-fundraise-after-losing-mother-to-heart-attack.jpg?w=640\")
Robyn Stephenson walking her dog Lily (PA)<\/p>\nA woman who lost her mother to a heart attack last St Stephen’s Day has walked 300,000 steps in her memory.<\/p>\n
Robyn Stephenson and her family are bracing themselves for both their first Christmas without her mother, Lorna, but also the anniversary of her death.<\/p>\n
She paid tribute to the former cafe owner who went on to work in sales, as the life of the party, and her best friend, who \u201clit up every room she walked into\u201d.<\/p>\n
Ms Stephenson walked 300,000 steps in November to raise money for the British Heart Foundation \u2013 and to try raise awareness of symptoms, adding she knows her mother would have been cheering her on.<\/p>\n
She did a lot of her walking along one of her mother\u2019s favourites routes, the Lagan towpath in Aghalee, Co Antrim, and said it helped with grief.<\/p>\n
Robyn Stephenson walking her dog Lily (PA)<\/p>\n
\u201cI had quite a lot of support from my friends and family, they came over after I finished work to come out with me,\u201d she told the Press Association.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd because my mummy died after a heart attack, I thought, I\u2019ll do it through the British Heart Foundation, because that covers all areas surrounding the heart and raise money for them. I just thought something like that would mean something.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou have your good days and your bad days when you\u2019re grieving\u2026 going out and having that fresh air helps, and if my friends of my auntie joined me for a walk so you had that social side too. If something had been bothering me or I was struggling, it helped me, instead of staying locked up in the house.\u201d<\/p>\n
She recalled noticing something not quite right with her mother on Boxing Day.<\/p>\n
\u201cI didn\u2019t know at the time, that feeling that you might be sick is like a symptom a heart attack,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
\u201cAt Christmas time you\u2019re all with your family, and you\u2019re having fun and you\u2019re having a couple of drinks and stuff, so it wasn\u2019t really anything that would have alarmed us.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe was a very happy go-lucky person so if anything was wrong with her, she would never say it.<\/p>\n
\u201cI didn\u2019t know things like that, so something that, like, I\u2019m looking out for now, within my own life, and my family, if they say something\u2019s wrong with them.<\/p>\n
\u201cI just want to help continue on the research, and to raise awareness, for everyone else be more made aware of it because I didn\u2019t have a clue.\u201d<\/p>\n
She added: \u201cShe\u2019s dearly missed by all her family and friends and there\u2019s not a day that goes by that we don\u2019t think of her and wish she was still here.\u201d<\/p>\n
Fearghal McKinney, head of British Heart Foundation Northern Ireland (BHF NI), said they are working towards more treatments and cures with lifesaving research into heart and circulatory diseases.<\/p>\n
\u201cDespite six decades of BHF progress, it is heart breaking to know that at this special time of year so many families like Robyn\u2019s have suffered unimaginable loss, and others are hoping and waiting for treatments and cures that we just don\u2019t have yet,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut thanks to the generosity of BHF supporters, we can fund vital research to drive progress and find those breakthroughs and cures of tomorrow.\u201d<\/p>\n
To donate to the British Heart Foundation this festive season and give a gift that keeps on living, visit bhf.org.uk\/Christmas<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A woman who lost her mother to a heart attack last St Stephen’s Day has walked 300,000 steps…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":207586,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[42,43,40,38,41,39],"class_list":["post-207585","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/207585","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=207585"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/207585\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/207586"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=207585"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=207585"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=207585"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}