We did it!!! On Sunday 21st April we ran the 2024 London Marathon for Anthony Nolan (the charity that gives people with blood cancer a second chance of life).

I'm doing the marathon with my long term running buddies Alison, Judith & Sian (Brenda already has a marathon ticked off and is doing the training with us). It was whilst running that Sian first realised she really wasn’t well and only a few months later she received the devastating news that she had acute myeloid leukemia, an aggressive blood cancer. Her only hope was an urgent stem cell transplant, and Anthony Nolan made that happen in April 2022. Every day we all thank Anthony Nolan, and the generous 24 year old who donated her stem cells (‘I’ve got the blood of a 24 year old!’ Sian likes to boast) and the team at the NHS Churchill Hospital who saved her life.

Running the marathon is a celebration of life and Sian, who turns 60 this year, is back to running (a marathon no less!) and is living life to the full. And it’s about raising loads of money for Anthony Nolan so that others can have the gift of a transplant and the chance to celebrate life too.

Between the 4 of us, we have set ourselves an ambitious target of raising £16K for Anthony Nolan and we have already collectively raised over £8K (£2K each) in offline donations, largely via our Christmas quiz, night at Colombo 7 and Tesco gift card top-ups - massive thank you to everyone who has supported any/all of these.

Huge thank you for sponsoring and encouraging me – the training plan involved running 619 miles over the last 19 weeks - it was tough and life had to be planned around the long weekend runs!

Having your support means the world and will really motivate and help me ❤️

And if you are aged 18-30 please think about becoming a donor. Details are here:

https://www.anthonynolan.org/help-save-a-life/join-stem-cell-register

With your help, together, we can keep saving lives.

Thank you so much xxx