I will be running the London Marathon in 2023 dressed as a giant Makka Pakka cartoon character and supporting the charity Mind, standing with the fight against mental health that so many of us live with every day. This is for all the young lads, young girls, older men, older women. This is for everyone.

I woke up one day to find some news that unfortunately is going to stay with me for the rest of my life - one of my best friends since I was 4 years old had died by suicide, someone I saw almost every day growing up - at school for 13 years & playing football with him every weekend for our local football team. His family and his friends, an endless list of people who loved him so much, were broken. I remember so many young brilliant people being in pieces the day after, paying respects as we did collectively as a school, but the thing I guess that alarmed me the most - I understood why someone would take their own life & I know there will have been others who would have understood too. We all struggled to come to terms with it, such a happy kid enjoying every day, to then end his life in a second with no signs at all. The mental health mask is a black beauty as I like to say, so amazing how someone can hide how they are really feeling all with a smile, but the dark side when deep down they feel suicidal, it’s a scary concept which shows how important it is to talk about things - which I know everyone is glad to see happening just that little bit more these days.

Mental health isn’t something that I’ve always understood, I remember as a naive 14 year old kid I was taking very little notice of mental health when it was brought into the public eye, struggling myself to understand why people would feel like that, I thought why couldn’t people just be happy, how hard can it be?! The next 5 years of my journey & seeing the effects it had on the people around me, along with myself, has been a humbling experience with countless valuable lessons, but everything that I’ve been through, guided by so many unbelievable people who have helped me, has shaped me to be the man I am today - and something I couldn’t imagine myself saying 2 years ago, that I am not only proud of others for making it through but also proud of myself for battling through depression, anxiety, self harm and suicidal thoughts. These are things of course I will still deal with from time to time, but I find myself in a much better place to deal with the challenges that I may face.

I can sit here as a 19 year old now, having experienced some huge obstacles, but as a stronger & better man as a result. I hope so many others can say this about themselves too. This is for John, we all love you mate, & for all the other boys, girls, men & women who didn’t make the night❤️