After last year’s success at the London Marathon, Team @EllisonDawes is coming together again to run the London Marathon again in 2024. The team this year is made up of new members: 

• Jon Lowe - a longstanding great friend who I keep following around the Army Air Corps, having succeeded him in no less than 3 jobs over the years.
• Pete Longland - one of my oldest and best friends. We have known each other since we were 4 years old, growing up in Petersfield together, and he now serves in the Metropolitan Police Force.
• Jan Green - a true friend who has committed to running the running for BCRT.

After missing the last couple of London marathons, I am determined to complete it this year and started training this summer. With a consolidated training plan and plenty of stretching, I am doing everything to remain injury-free so that I can run in memory of Ellison and do him proud. 

I wrote the words below last year, to tell Ellison’s story and explain why we are raising funds for the Bone Cancer Research Trust. I don’t want to change my words, because they still describe the pain of losing him so acutely, and because every year that goes by is a year further away from him, my beautiful son, who would have been 14 this year.

Ellison’s story:

My son, Ellison James Knightly Dawes, died on 3 Feb 2021 after battling Ewing’s Sarcoma, a rare form of bone cancer. He was diagnosed in April 2020 and fought with the utmost bravery through 9 months of aggressive cancer treatment. 

I frequently look for the words to adequately describe those 9 months, and life now, but I can't. Physically, my stomach feels like a ball of concrete being twisted and twisted and I still feel overwhelming moments of dread that the world continues on without him in it. But Ellison never complained about his cancer, asking only once ‘why is this happening to me?’. He faced his illness not just bravely, but with patience and grace – even teaching me along the way that I needed to be kinder to the doctors and nurses, when I became frustrated that they weren’t curing him quickly enough. 

During his last month, he read a story about a little boy whose sister was ill and an angel called Skellig cures her. Ellison asked his teacher, during one of his final zoom calls before he became too ill for school work, why an angel couldn’t come and save him. 

A cure for this appalling disease needs to be found, to ensure that stories like Ellison’s become a thing of the past. The BCRT’s research into bone cancer is the first step. Supporting this charity is like capturing a little bit of the spirit of Skellig.