Thanks for taking the time to visit my JustGiving page.

My name is Chloe. I'm a runner, I'm a wife, I'm a friend, and I'm a psychologist. The last bit I like to keep a secret, it doesn't usually help me make friends!


For the last 12 years I have worked alongside people of all ages, often crippled by mental illness. More powerfully, I have also seen the devastating impact that mental illness has had on those close to me, as well as the hope and strength that has come from overcoming it.
The reality is that we all have mental health, some days it's good, and some days it's bad. For a long time I have used running to help me maintain some, often questionable, level of good mental health. So I now want to use running to help me raise awareness, and add to the conversation on how we all have mental health. How we all need to work to maintain good mental health.


We all know the statistic - 1 in 4 people experience a mental health problem. Those problems often occur when we neglect our mental health, we let life get on top of us, let problems build up, and end up feeling stressed and overwhelmed.


Last year I followed the heads together campaign for the London marathon, and was so moved by the people with chronic mental illnesses who took on the challenge of mind over marathon to run London. As well as being a little jealous of them getting the opportunity to run London, I wanted to be involved in adding to the conversation about mental health.


I also really want to run the London marathon...


So in October I am planning to run the Amsterdam marathon. I want to use it as an opportunity to raise money for Mind - one of the Heads Together charities. I didn't want to make it too easy, so I want to run it in under 3hrs 45mins, which will allow me to apply for a good for age place at London 2020. This means the training will be hard. 

I'm going to share my training plan over the next few weeks, before I start my training properly in June. If you are feeling a little bit generous, you can donate any amount you feel able to, if you are feeling super generous, you can choose a week on my training plan, and sponsor me for every mile that week I manage to run.

I am planning on using Instagram and my blog to continue the conversation about mental health, as well as to share my training, so please follow me @diary_of_a_girl_who_runs or www.diaryofagirlwhoruns.wordpress.com, so you laugh, cry, despair, and hopefully learn something along with me!

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