Success: Singer Klaire de Lys meets her fundraising goal

Singer and artist Klaire de Lys has succeeded in her quest to raise £5000 to establish a bursary to help fund Davis dyslexia programs. As promised in her quest, she shaved her head on August 9, donating her hair to the charity Wigs for Kids.

Klaire explains that the money raised will “help cover the costs of Davis facilitators who will be helping families who would otherwise be unable to afford the course. I was very lucky to have a family friend who recognised my dyslexia and offered to help me for free. … I don’t think I’ll ever be able to clearly express how much it changed my life, and allowed me to achieve the things I had always dreamed of doing..” 

Klaire described her personal experience growing up with dyslexia in a blog post in July called My Dyslexia Story:

 [O]nce I went to school thing like maths and spelling became extremely hard. To the point I would get migraines just by looking at numbers. Although I didn’t realise it (neither did my parents or my teachers) I was heavily dyslexic (which meant that my way of learning was with pictures and not words). . . .

Things got so bad over the years that I would have a panic attack every time I had to do maths, any kind of test/exam. Also, just the idea of socialising or talking to people would make my knees start shaking. My brain felt like I had a clamp on it permanently

No matter how many hours I forced myself to read, and attempt to re-read and understand what I had to learn, my brain just refused to absorb it.

Klaire finally got help at age 16 when a family friend who is also a licensed Davis Facilitator offered to work with her without charge:

She offered to correct my Dyslexia and I can’t even begin to accurately describe the difference it made to my life.

I had gotten so used to having a permanent headache/migraine from the stress and constant confusion that I thought it was normal.

On the second day of the course that pain suddenly disappeared, I felt like I had just realised that I’d been in a mental prison my whole life and someone had just helped me walk out the front door, moving a clamp from my head in the process.

Perhaps Klaire expresses her feelings best in her song, Paper Wings: 

Klaire’s generosity and willingness to give of herself is just the beginning. Supporters can build on her efforts by continuing to donate to the bursary fund here:  http://www.davislearningfoundation.org.uk/bursaryfund.html