It's been six months since I had to pull out of the London Marathon 2016, with only a few days to go, when I was diagnosed with a stress fracture in my back. Having raised raised £2,813 in support of the British Heart Foundation, it was heartbreaking to not make it to the start line - especially after all the blood, sweat and tears of training. 

Even with the rather unfortunate ending to my 2016 Marathon journey, it was an incredible experience. Over the months of training, I had the opportunity to talk to so many of you about why I was running for the British Heart Foundation. It's because of this that I'm so excited to run with the BHF again in the 2017 London Marathon, and to keep fundraising for this immensely personal cause. 

The marathon started as a way for me to give back after a lifetime of cardiac care; however, as I started my fundraising and awareness conversations many months ago, I began to realise that this experience would give back to me much more than I could ever have imagined.

As many of you know, the British Heart Foundation is a charity incredible close to my heart. I was born with a coarctation of the aorta (in non-medical language, the main artery taking blood out of my heart was too small) which, to my great luck, was spotted by an incredible doctor a few months into my life. Several surgeries and over 23 years later, I feel very lucky that I'm in good enough health to do something as mental as running continually for over 4 hours. 

With 1 in 180 babies diagnosed with a congenital heart defect (an average of 12 per day in the UK), not all children are as lucky as I was; and with over 7 million people living with heart and circulatory disease in the UK, not all adults are able to access the ongoing support required for those of us living with heart conditions. 

While last years journey didn't end up exactly as planned, I'm so lucky to have the opportunity to take another stab at the London Marathon. So, here goes - Take 2! I'm aiming to hit a total of £5,000 over the two years, meaning I'm working to a target of £2187.17 this time around. Any support you'd be able to pitch in over the next few months would truly mean the world to me - and will go towards funding critical research projects and programmes to bring hope to millions of people living with or affected by heart conditions.