Excerpts
Imelda Hitchcock is proud, she’s passionate, she leads from the front and she loves to win.
She’s vigorously supported two major organisations since 1980.
But, as she recalled in her warm wee flat on Ranfurly St, she has not always been in a position where she could excel.
… Imelda says it wasn’t until high school that she really discovered an interest in being an organiser, something which translates to her work with the blind and anti-fluoride advocates.
… Her list of achievements is vast: school sports captain; miniature rifle champion; helping set up the West End Soccer Club; chairperson of the Blind Foundation; a staunch anti-fluoride campaigner, and the list goes on.
… Imelda says it was her husband who pushed her towards the anti-fluoride bandwagon. A day he’d live to regret, she feels.
“I had a medical problem which I didn’t have (previously). I noticed a year after the fluoride had been in the water I had this terrible problem and on three occasions I went to Christchurch and lived with my son who lived in an un-fluoridated area and after a few days everything came right.
“I came home and I said to my husband, ‘it must be something that I’m ingesting’, and he, unfortunately for him, said, ‘do you think it’s the fluoride in the water?’ He regretted the day he ever said that,” she chuckles.
Safe to say, the fluoride debate can be a heated one, but Imelda, true to form, is quick to point out she’s “had a wonderful time with it”.
“I still believe I’m right with the fluoridation,” she says…