My Story

I will be running my first marathon in April 2025 to raise money for the charity Contact, who provide support for families with disabled children. I took up running in 2012 after having 3 children, and have previously run 5 Cambridge Half Marathons since 2020 and many Cambourne 10 km races. I am proud that my running has raised around £2000 for various charities including Noonan Syndrome Association UK, Tom’s Trust, Cancer Research UK and The Scout Association. London Marathon 2025 will be my biggest challenge yet and I aim to smash my fundraising record!

My daughter Rose has the genetic condition Noonan Syndrome (NS) and has conquered many challenges in her life. At 4 ½ months it was found she had a heart murmur and this was characterised as pulmonary valve stenosis, a diagnostic feature of NS. She also had developmental delay and poor growth. At age 6 ½ she started growth hormone treatment. This has been successful in increasing her growth over her predicted final height of 4 feet 9 inches to 5 feet 2 inches by age 16. It also built up her muscles which lacked tone causing her gross motor problems. She was able to participate in dance classes and coached younger children in this and gymnastics, which she loved.

Rose also has a learning disability and learning differences (ADHD, dyslexia and dyscalculia), so I had take advice from Contact for how to apply for an Education Health Care Plan so she could receive 1:1 support from a Teaching Assistant in mainstream school to access the curriculum. Contact have also helped me find out how to apply for a Children’s and Families Needs Assessment, Disability Living Allowance, Personal Independence Allowance and Carer’s Allowance.

She went on to study Childcare at college and is now in her first job as an Early Years Practitioner, for which she has support through Access to Work. I am sure that Rose has managed to achieve her potential in life through accessing all of the support that Contact has recommended for her, and we are so grateful to them.

About us

The London Marathon has become an annual, inspiring and colourful fixture in the world’s sporting calendar since the inaugural race on 29 March 1981: a celebration of fun, fundraising and fancy dress.

Over the years more than a million people have completed the 26.2-mile course – which runs from Blackheath to The Mall, with a spectacular finish in front of Buckingham Palace, showcasing the very best that the capital city has to offer.

What’s more, these participants have raised over a billion pounds for charity and there have been countless amazing tales of human achievement throughout the event’s history – living up to its aim of helping participants ‘to have fun, and provide some happiness and sense of achievement in a troubled world’.