04/09/2024
Just four days to go and I'm looking forward to doing the Great North Run for the first time.
We are running as a family team, we're all from South Shields and we've all had significant birthdays in the last year. I was 60 in May, my sister Donna Heron 50 in December and Mam Joyce was 80 in April!
Mam has always been at points along the Great North Run route supporting family and friends and each year said she wished she had done it when younger. This year, being all of our big birthdays, we thought let’s get her to that finish line! Mam agreed straight away, although she did say she wanted to walk/run it all! She'll be doing a little walking but we'll be pushing her in a wheelchair most of the way.
Donna has run the GNR about a dozen times but this will be my first time. Training for me began in early February, starting with increasingly longer dog walks, adding short bouts of jogging, eventually jogging/running more than walking, gradually hitting my distance targets and getting to 14 miles in early July. I now have a very fit King Charles Cavalier! The running has been the relatively easy part - pushing Mam in a wheelchair has proven to be much more difficult. Mam lives near to the coast road at South Shields so our training route has been the last few miles of the Great North Run. We have increased the distance gradually over the weeks for Mam's comfort with the longest run so far being 8 miles. Using the wheelchair has made us appreciate how difficult our paths and roads are for those who regularly need a chair for transport. Kerbs, potholes and uneven paving can make controlling a wheelchair very difficult. We've had a few near misses with the chair suddenly coming to a stop or wanting to topple sideways. Having broken two wheelchairs (but fortunately not Mam) we are now onto the third. We now have an all terrain chair with pneumatic tyres and larger front castors and we're hoping this one will make it to the finishing line.
We are fundraising for Children’s Cancer North, a charity which as a family we have fundraised for over recent years after my nephew's best friend was diagnosed with leukaemia at 10yrs of age. Heartbreakingly, after ringing the bell he relapsed and we lost him in 2019 at 14yrs of age. Children’s Cancer North is a charity who provide support to families living with childhood cancer, raise awareness and do essential research here in Newcastle. There isn’t enough research into childhood cancer and that is something we vowed to fundraise for. Drew was like another grandson to my Mam and is missed every day. He was a great footballer, sporty, and his humour made everyone who met him smile.
Doing the Great North Run gives us another opportunity to fundraise and bring awareness to the charity.
If you would like to make a donation to Children's Cancer North then here is the link to our fundraising page:
https://l.facebook.com/l.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fajbellgreatnorthrun2024.enthuse.com%2Fpf%2Fdonna-heron%3Ffbclid%3DIwZXh0bgNhZW0CMTAAAR27-7k8Tc1q35QoHl4lCTa3Y82YNWUVk5J1nLwFTU97Q4qYtALcAwJBrQ4_aem_17lQ-PEpp7RkAjBROrdiAQ&h=AT3xmejQ8njYGzXPUAZ3KyHBTOq26wY5pyFKoMIf7UM1OwNJstNmn_bqtQhAm0PK4nQ-vmhz6w3hqts49BbKXl0Qb1dbVIt8fJCQZYu3pM47c0fUCRTGRa_S3gcgoeZlWeRcOU6ehwh8w8z1&__tn__=-UK-R&c[0]=AT34SP156-sm1ylWZ8Snquf9CuhM7mW1FV8JJLlxY9vKRvOCqZH3FLGK7-TykJ16wSetaPeS5LZJSwOqramRYrHe3PanrN8RniL-xbrxw9w3cVUvYKJkdxn1QMM1K4p11SFOuk34Ym8yNCdJyLATv6IJ9fwPosdWTp0ZIGeVXe0ojae35Yjuig
Any donations will be greatly appreciated.
