On 16th September I’ll be taking part in Ironman Italy in the beautiful Emilia Romagna region - my first Ironman triathlon and my 3rd ever triathlon. An Ironman is a slightly bonkers endeavour: a 3.8km swim, 180km bike, and a 42.2km run.

The photo above is of me and my biggest supporters in May this year following a half Ironman. The final kilometres of that race were extremely tough so the idea of doing it all twice over excites and petrifies me in equal measure. I’ve done a lot more training since then so here goes!

Florence and Albie are absolutely perfect and Mike and I are eternally thankful for them, however, the experience of bringing them into the world could have been so much better. Ultimately, I was one of the 3-8% of women who give birth in the UK, diagnosed with PTSD. The physical trauma also meant I struggled to run for years and was eventually diagnosed with a prolapse and told to stop running. Whilst some of the trauma was due to unavoidable medical complications, it was exacerbated by an over-stretched maternity unit and a system that seems to accept collateral damage to mothers’ health because it’s always been that way. I am very lucky in that I was able to access specialist women’s health physiotherapy, surgery, treatment with a clinical psychologist and, have the support of a wonderful husband, but not everyone is that fortunate.

The Ironman represents the pinnacle of my recovery journey, both physically and mentally, and so in doing it I would love to raise money to help make birth experiences better. Fortunately, there is an organisation with exactly that aim – they are even called ‘Make Birth Better’. There is more information about their work below and a link to their website. I would be very grateful if you could support their cause.

Nicky. xx

For information about Women’s Health Physiotherapy: https://www.physiomum.co.uk/resources

To follow my progress on the day you can download the Ironman Athlete Tracker: https://www.ironman.com/app-tracking-information

To find out more about Make Birth Better: www.makebirthbetter.org.

Make Birth Better exists to end suffering from birth trauma through support, campaigning and clinically-led training. They are a unique collective of parents and professionals on a mission to make sure everyone knows about birth trauma and how to find the support they need.

Birth trauma describes symptoms of trauma relating to birth and/or circumstances around the birth. Between 25-40% of women in the UK find some aspect of their birth traumatic (up to 270,000 per year) and between 3-8% of women who give birth in the UK will suffer from postnatal PTSD (up to 54,000 per year). Birth trauma is often preventable. It is always diagnosable. It is always treatable. Yet despite its common presentation, birth trauma is usually dismissed, forgotten or misdiagnosed.

Make Birth Better is a not-for-profit community interest company (CIC). A CIC works almost the same as a charity however the CIC set-up allows them to raise funds through their paid-for training delivered to NHS teams and other maternity professionals. This is why we have to use the crowdfunding option provided by JustGiving. Please note you will not be asked to Gift Aid your donation.