As many of you will know, When he was born in November 2004, Jake had to spend a week in the ICU part of SCBU and then a further week in SCBU before he could come home. The staff at Chesterfield Royal were amazing, and, without doubt, if Jake had been a home birth or without the care of the NHS, it would have been a very different situation.  For reasons we will never know, Jake's adrenal glands were not working and so he had no cortisol and no blood sugar so was on medication for 6 weeks, until he had  a controlled withdrawal at the Children's in Sheffield, and he was signed off at 3 months. 

As we approach his 18th birthday, I am giving up processed and added sugar for a month. I will still eat fruit, but no chocolate, biscuits, cakes, jam, marmalade, scones, fruit loaf etc for 31 days.

I have an incredibly sweet tooth, and so I am more apprehensive about this than I was about running for a month back in April, but the NHS is in crisis, they saved Jake's life and I need to so this.

On top of everything that Jake went through in his two weeks, Dan spent a week in the same hospital in September and, again, the nursing staff were amazing. He also seemed to spend most weekends in A&E when he was playing rugby, so the Royal is a hospital that has done an awful lot for our family unit.

Thank you for whatever you can give.

Now for the official bit......

Through our 'Protect Your NHS' appeal we're looking for donations that will make a real difference at an unprecedented time of challenge. Like the rest of the NHS, the hospital and its primary care services are under extreme pressure as part of the UK’s response to the Coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak. We have never experienced such demand for NHS care and treatment. Our ‘Protect the NHS’ appeal is about using your generous donations to gift health and wellbeing experiences to staff and gift enhanced care and facilities to patients.