Rachael Brooking raising money for Huntington's NSW & ACT

She is helping to raise money for Huntington's NSW and ACT which supports people with the progressive brain disorder caused by a defective gene.

In the Central West, more than 30 families have felt the impact of Huntington's, including Ms Brooking herself who saw her mum die at age 50 from the disease and whose brother is about to go into full-time care at just 44-years-old.

"There's just not the awareness out there. People are often not just caring for one person with a disability, they are dealing with possibly, two, three or four in their immediate family," she said.

"They are snowed under trying to care for these loved ones.

"We've actually lost three HD angels this year, one just the other day out here. It's been a pretty tough year for everyone and it's super important that we try and get specialist services to try and help these families."

This Saturday was meant to be the Orange Walk 4 Hope event, where money raised would go towards funding a rural support social worker who would be able to visit and help families out west.

But as lockdown restrictions put an end to this, Ms Brooking and the rest of the team had to get creative.

"We're asking people on Saturday to donate their coffee money," she added.

"That's a little amount, $5, $3.50 or however much. I know Orange is a huge coffee drinking town so it would be interesting to see how much we could get up to after Saturday. It's a little amount, but little amounts add up to big things."

She herself had a 50 per cent chance of inheriting the Huntington's gene and said creating awareness around the illness was also crucial.

"I started doing fundraising about seven years ago because there's really not a lot of help and support out in the rural areas," she added.

"We get little to no government funding and there's a similar number of people in Australia with Huntington's disease as there are with Motor Neurone Disease. There's just not the awareness out there."

So she will continue to walk, dressed in pink and green, and is asking everyone else to jump on board and remember to make a donation this Saturday.

For information on how to donate, search 'HD Awareness Orange NSW' on Facebook or by going to directly to her donation page here.

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