I am cycling the distance between Queen Elizabeth Hospital Birmingham and St Marks Hospital London (116miles/186km), the two hospitals which treated me. As I am still housebound and unable to sit on a real bike, I will be doing this using my trusty pedal cycle:

Until recently I couldn’t even sit up in bed for longer than a few minutes, so I will be doing this cycle ride over the course of a month – for me this is still a huge challenge!

I am doing this to raise money for Ward 727 at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital. Having spent a year on 727 and with its wonderful staff, this ward means a great deal to me. They have saved my life on more than one occasion when I have had life-threatening episodes of sepsis, and just as importantly they have been like family to me throughout my stay, keeping me (almost) sane. This ward cares deeply for its patients, and have done many things to make being in hospital just that little bit better. For example, I’ve spent the last two Christmasses on the ward, and they raised money to buy every patient there on Christmas day a small gift. Some of the staff even brought in games to keep me entertained!

I have been very lucky to have lots of visitors throughout the whole of my stay (thank you!), but it really struck me how many patients have no one, and the hospital can be a very boring and unstimulating place. This ward has been my home for so long (they even started to refer to me as ‘part of the furniture’!), so in return for the amazing care I received, I would like to raise money for the ward to use to make the patients’ experience that bit better – for example, activities for the day room, puzzles or games, to keep patients with no visitors entertained etc.

In addition, I would like to use this opportunity to raise awareness. I have intestinal failure as a result of Ehlers Danlos Syndrome, and one of the consequences of this is gastroparesis.

As a result of this intestinal failure, I cannot eat food normally. Instead, I have a tube directly into my small intestine, therefore bypassing my stomach, which is used for all my food, fluids and medication. If you see me carrying around a little backpack all the time, this holds my feed and pump and is what keeps me nourished.

It causes me a lot of problems, but it’s what keeps me alive! Much as this doesn't sound like fun, there are many people who suffer this much worse than me, or even require feeding directly into the veins. I tried this but it keep giving me sepsis, but I have a number of friends from hospital who still rely on this option. If you are interested in learning more about artificial nutrition, please visit PINNT.

This cause, and in particular ward 727 are personally very important to me which is why I am undertaking this cycling challenge, which will run from 13th August for one month. Any donations or sponsorship you are able to give will be greatly appreciated by myself and more importantly by patients on the ward.

Thank you!