Hi and welcome to my Just Giving Page!

Do you take walking for granted? Steps don’t.

Steps is the UK national charity working for all those whose lives are affected by childhood lower limb conditions; and in 2020 I’m running the London Marathon to do a little bit to help them raise funds and awareness of their work.

Every year in the UK, 2,500 babies are born with a serious childhood lower limb conditions. These leg conditions vary in their symptoms, frequency and prognosis. But without the correct diagnosis, treatment and support, it would be impossible for any of these children to walk properly later in life.

I myself was born with a lower limb disorder, a severe talipes of my left leg/foot (a club foot in common language); and like many others, I had to undergo a number of rather extensive operations to correct my condition from the day I was born. I learnt to walk with a cast on my left leg up to my hip and spent countless days and weeks in and out of hospital. As a family we spent so much time going back and forth, struggling to get any sort of support for my condition.  Still 20 years later some government departments don’t recognise certain lower limb disorders as disabilities worthy of any form of support.

I try not to let my condition get in the way of me living my life but, to this day I am unable to wear high heels or other types of beautiful shoes other girls can due to the way my disorder was corrected and the constant pain I have to live through daily as a result of the muscle wastage on my left leg.

I have decided that after 24 years of living with my condition and seeing little or no governmental support, I wanted to do something to help others like me. I want to raise money to contribute to more research by Steps, but I also want to inspire others with similar lower limb disorders and show that you can live a normal life and do exceptional things – like run a marathon – even though the doctors told me as a child I would struggle to walk unaided, let alone be able to run!

Steps is a small charity and has only a modest budget of less than £200,000. But with more funding, there is so much more they can do!

Please donate as little or as much as you can to support their work because like them I don’t take walking for granted!

Thank you.

https://www.steps-charity.org.uk/