My Story

I did it! Last Sunday was an incredible experience with amazing support all the way round the course on a beautiful day.

My chip time was 3:49:57 (for anyone who is interested, my actual marathon time on Strava was 3:45:38).
When I agreed to do this marathon many months ago, the time I had in my head was 3:45 and so I am really delighted with how things went. 

It was great to be part of the Love Oliver team for the weekend, here is why I did it:

Oliver was a beautiful little boy with a lovely smile. I met him in my job as a paediatric doctor here in Fife. He had been diagnosed with a rare form of cancer in the first few weeks of life and had undergone chemotherapy in Edinburgh. Tragically this had not led to a cure. Along with the amazing people at Rachel House (CHAS) we were able to look after him and his mum and dad, Andy and Jennifer, at home where they wanted to be.

The year was 2010, the year of the great freeze, when the M8 froze over, and the temperature didn’t go above zero for a couple of weeks in December. It was also the year that I was to get married; Jo and I planning our wedding for December 28th.

I remember going out to the Gills house in Leven, with Gill Deaves the community children’s nurse, through the snow covered streets.

He died peacefully, at the age of nearly 6 months, at home on Christmas morning.

My experience is that many families who have gone through the horror of their child dying want to “do something”. Rarely do I see this implemented with the focus and tenacity that I have seen with Andy and Jennifer.

Love Oliver is a great charity.

It funds a research fellow in Newcastle with the aim of improving survival rates for children like Oliver. It also provides very practical support for families of children with cancer at the children’s hospital in Edinburgh, providing meals and a safe space off the ward. All these things that Andy and Jennifer remember as being important for families in this most stressful of situations. They also serve their local community and raise money by selling second hand clothes and toys in their popular shop in the Kingdom centre in Glenrothes.

I have always wanted to do the London Marathon. So when the opportunity came to do it for Love Oliver, it seemed absolutely the right time to do it.

Please give what you can.