My Story

Hi. My name is Elaine (Lainey) and I’m running the London Marathon as part of the Pancreatic Cancer UK charity team. So, not to put too fine a point on it, I want your money…I mean support!

People always ask about the ‘why’. Well, the ‘why’ is that pancreatic cancer is a sadly underfunded area of research, meaning that it has a shockingly low survival rate of only 5-7%. Pancreatic cancer affects approximately the same number of people, in the same age range, as leukemia, but through investment in research new treatments for leukemia have increased the survival rate by 40%. Leukemia research has received around a billion pounds more funding in the last 20 years than pancreatic cancer, which is one of the reasons that 5-7% survival rate hasn’t improved in over 40 years. Pancreatic cancer research desperately needs more investment, because in many instances it is only detected when it is far too late for effective treatment. Among other things, they are working on a very exciting and promising test to simply and non-invasively detect pancreatic as well as many other cancers, and obviously greater funds allow greater research.

But that’s not my real ‘why’. My real ‘why’ - other than apparently losing my mind - is that on February 7th last year my husband, Jack, was told he had cancer, and he passed away on March 27th, seven weeks after diagnosis. He was only 64 years old. The toll that the disease took on him was brutal and cruel, and I think the most devastating thing was how it took his dignity from him, replacing it with tremendous pain. I took up running this spring to honour his memory since he was a long distance runner in his younger days, and I have so far completed three 10K runs (two for Cancer Research UK, one for the Stroke Association).

Any sponsorship at all would be very gratefully received, both by myself and the wider charity. Pancreatic Cancer UK is the official main charity of next year’s marathon, which will help hugely in raising awareness of this awful disease.