HI my name is Kirsteen Dempsey and this year I’m going to run the Connermarathon in aid of Cancer Support Group Mallorca!!!

This exceedingly tough marathon runs through some of the most dramatic, beautiful scenery in Ireland and also through bogs, hills, lakes and the Twelve Pins mountain range, around the Maam Turk Mountain and all the way to Maam Cross.

Cancer Support Group Mallorca offer practical help, support and counselling to anyone of any nationality and their families who have been touched by cancer on the island. Being this sick where you don’t speak the language can only add to the distress, so imagine MacMillan with translators and you’ve got a good idea as to the services they provide.

Breast cancer hit our family when my mother (sadly now deceased) was diagnosed, not once but twice, resulting in long hard going invasive toxic treatment and eventually a mastectomy. My mum never really recovered from this disease in terms of how it affected her health in general and it was a very traumatic time for Mum, my sister Kathy and all of our families.

Our family has many friends in Mallorca and among them are the amazing ladies who works so hard for the Cancer Support Group. It is a privilege to be able to support them. My sister does it by holding parties and I plan to do it by running up steep hills and down dramatic dales. I feel privileged and very blessed, as a reasonably fit and healthy woman of 50!! to be in a position to do this challenge.

I am training hard despite having suffered from 3 chest infections and a problem with sinus infections which is not very nice!! But I am a very determined woman!!!

I hope you will be generous and put your hands deep into your pockets to help me to raise money for this wonderful charity and the women whose lives are or have been and continue to be affected by cancer.

Yours in anticipation
Kirsteen Dempsey