37 years old, slightly overweight and certainly not built to run 26 miles...

But the opportunity to run for the Alzheimer's Society has meant i have dusted off my running shoes, washed my knee supports and begun pounding the streets of Beckenham in preparation for the event in April.  

I’m aiming to get round in about 4 hours 30. Appreciate I won’t be challenging Mo anytime soon but considering before this I counted sports as darts and ten pin bowling it’s a big challenge for me.

The word ‘dementia’ describes a set of symptoms that includes memory loss and difficulties with thinking, problem-solving or language. These changes are often small to start with, but for someone with dementia they have become severe enough to affect daily life. 

Dementia is caused when the brain is damaged by diseases, such as Alzheimer’s disease or a series of strokes. Alzheimer’s disease is the most common cause of dementia, but not the only one. 

There are currently around 850,000 people in the UK with dementia. It mainly affects people over the age of 65 (one in 14 people in this age group have dementia), and the likelihood of developing dementia increases significantly with age. However, dementia can affect younger people too. There are more than 42,000 people in the UK under 65 with dementia. 

We are all happily living for longer now but this only increases the risk that we (or someone we care about) will be affected. 

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