Imagine how scary and bewildering it would be waking up in a hospital with a huge open wound in your chest filled with life saving equipment and for all intent and purpose having a large plaster holding in your life saving pipes, wires and bodily organs?

Oscar, my grandson was born on the 29 January 2013 and can imagine nothing else. In fact this has been the normality of his little life so far, having never left hospital since his birth and only surviving with the aid of major surgery, his first major heart surgery at 2 days old, lots of drugs and a Berlin heart. He has been in the hands of surgeons, doctors and nurses everyday of his life, of which some days have been very touch and go. If it wasn’t for some passionate and dedicated professional help Oscar would not be here with us now. If it was not for The Birmingham Children’s Hospital(BCH) we would not be looking forward to the day when Oscar will no longer need machines or drugs to keep him going and even dreaming of the day he will be at home playing with his brothers and sisters.

Our whole family owes so much to the hospital, the staff and the charities that have supported not only Oscar but mum, dad and all his brothers and sisters through this extreme of times. In a bid to show my own gratitude for their dedication, support and care given to Oscar whilst fulfilling one of my lifetime goals, I decided to undertake a serious challenge and take part in the London Marathon in 2014. I would like to achieve this personal goal and do some good in the process by raising as much money as I can along the way; BCH was my obvious choice and my first goal being to raise £10000 for them.

This money will go a long way in supporting the children and families through some of the toughest times they have to endure. A £5 donation would provide a bunch of colouring books and crayons that really do help while away the hours spent in the hospital, or be a small contribution towards one of the mechanical hearts that cost £42,000 each. Oscar’s Berlin heart kept him alive and the cost never came into it, you never have time to even think of such things at the time. Finding out these costs after the fact are quite overwhelming, the total cost of care provided to Oscar is massive and I want to try and pay some of it back.

Birmingham Children’s Hospital treats around 250,000 children each year and I know each and every family owes them a debt of gratitude. They really do go the extra mile making all of our children as comfortable as possible with a level of care that is second to none. I sincerely hope you will never have to rely on any hospital with your own children, however please do spare a thought for all those children and parents that do. Any donation you can spare to support my goal especially during these hard times would be very welcome, from a £1 text donation to a £1000 corporate sponsorship. If you do have any questions or want any further information on Oscar Tasker he does have his own little Facebook and Twitter pages and is very easy to find on Google. Please keep coming back as I will update this page as often as I am able and I will let you know of my progress as I train for this marathon of tasks.

Thank you for taking the time to visit my JustGiving page.

Donating through JustGiving.com or by text is simple, fast and totally secure. Your details are safe with JustGiving as they will never sell them on or send unwanted emails. Once you donate, they’ll send your money directly to the charity. So it’s the most efficient way to donate saving time and cutting costs for the BCH charity.

Kindest Regards

Mark