Mum who set up crowdfunding page asking people to finance a £5k Disney trip for her and her daughters blasts trolls
Healthcare assistant Nikki Smith, 33, was slammed after setting up a page on GoFundMe
A MUM slammed after launching a crowdfund campaign for a family holiday to Disney has blasted trolls who branded her a scrounger.
The Sun Online revealed healthcare assistant Nikki Smith, 33, set up a page on GoFundMe asking for £5,000 to take her and her two daughters to Florida.
She said she couldn't afford to do more shifts "because of childcare" and wanted to "show them how much I appreciate and love them".
But the appeal only raised a tenner before Nikki, who works two nights a week at a local hospital, was branded a "scrounger" and a "beggar" and took it down.
One outraged man wrote: "PAY FOR YOUR OWN HOLIDAYS!!!!" while a woman added: "Why should the rest of us scrimp and save !!! For her to scrounge !!!!!"
Nikki today spoke out to defend her fundraising bid - which was mockingly shared more than 19,000 times - and says she's a hard-working mother.
The mum, of Coalpit Heath, Bristol, said: "People have been comparing me to a homeless beggar and things like that. I'm absolutely traumatised by it all.
"I don't go on my Facebook any more because all my friends have been sharing it and I'm quite scared about my children going to school and being picked on.
Most read in news
"Some of the comments were disgusting.
"They were picking on my children and one man said, 'If I give you £5,000 would I be able to keep your children?'
"There were people calling me a beggar and a scrounger, but I didn't put it on there for that reason.
"I work at a hospital on a zero hours contract and I'm struggling to get two nights a week. I have been trying to get more but it is so hard.
"My parents both work - my mum works in care and my dad works nights - and the children are too young to be left alone.
"I have got bills and shopping and everything, and children. I have got a little bit of money but not enough to be able to save up to take them away.
"They love everything Disney and have got all the DVDs and clothes. They watch it all the time.
"They said to me, 'Mum, I really want to go to Disneyworld,' but I thought, 'There's no way I'll be able to save up. They will be 20 before I can afford to go over there.'"
Desperate to treat her girls, Nikki set up the page last Monday and it had gone viral by Friday, with thousands of comments flooding in over the weekend.
It was shut down after she was shocked by the comments over her petition to take her children, aged ten and 12, on holiday.
She's since put the appeal back up online with a new post explaining herself - and has even been donated £90 by six donors.
But though colleagues, friends and neighbours have been supportive, even her DAD thought it was a silly move.
Nikki said: "My dad said, 'What have you done now?' But all my other family have been very supportive - it's just strangers who have been mean.
"I hadn't used GoFundMe before and I heard about it from a friend who had set up a page that helped go towards their travelling around Asia.
"I went on there and looked through and saw there is a travel section and hopes, dreams and wishes, so I looked on a few.
"I saw a few for 'Disneyland' and there were people asking for new cars and things like that so I set a page up and thought, 'If it doesn't happen, it doesn't happen.'
"I regret putting it up now - I wish I had never thought about it. I just can't understand why we have been picked out - there are a lot of other ones on there.
"Everyone is saying, 'You can't expect me to put my hard-earned savings into your holiday when I can't even take my children away,' but I wasn't asking them to do that.
"If people want to they can, or they can just scroll past.
"You don't need to leave horrible comments. It's horrible and it makes me feel like crap.
"I'm not a bad person. I'm a good mum.
"The main thing on my mind was to just make my children happy and give them a treat."
We pay for your stories! Do you have a story for The Sun Online news team? Email us at [email protected] or call 0207 782 4368