I'm helping the 1 in every 125 babies born in the UK with a serious heart condition. Support me throughout February  as I take on my 125 challenge for babies born with serious heart conditions.

At our 20 week scan, our son Raffy was diagnosed with a serious heart defect called Transposition of the Great Arteries. This is where the main arteries of the heart form the wrong way round preventing oxygen from being pumped around the body. Without open heart surgery to correct this, babies with this condition don’t survive. As this defect was picked up by the Sonographer before birth, we were able to be in the right place at Southampton Hospital  with a specialist cardiac team to take care of Raffy who was extremely poorly after he was born. Had this gone undetected, our story would have been very different. We are one of the lucky families but around 6000 babies are born with a congenital heart defect each year with 1000 of these going undetected. These babies are sent home with a  life threatening condition . 

Tiny Tickers is a charity supporting families of children with congenital heart defects. Through their work, the charity train Sonographers to spot defects during routine pregnancy scans; support families with a diagnosis; campaign to improve service standards; raise awareness; and support academic research. This charity helped us immensely after Raffy’s diagnosis giving us access to advice, support and stories from other heart families who had gone through the same thing. 

I will be attempting to run 125k in the space of a month to raise funds for this amazing charity (No easy feat after not exercising for the last 12 months!) I know times are tough right now so if you can spare a pound or two to help babies like Raffy and their families,  I will be eternally grateful!