I was first diagnosed with ME at the age of 12 after having glandular fever,  I did not recover from this so many months of hospital visits led to my diagnosis. This had a big impact on my teenage years spending much of my time unable to join in with school activities and general growing up.  I was always very active and enjoyed many sports. I spent 5 years managing my health along with my education with lots of support from my family.  Much of my time was spent in bed unable to move and many nights of severe pain.  I was then very lucky and things started to get easier for me, my pain levels went down and I had more energy.  As the years went on I was able to lead a relatively 'normal' life with my ME in the background.  I was well enough and able to train for and run the London Marathon which is an achievement I am very proud of and can only dream about doing again.  In 2018 I caught the flu, this hit me hard and with my immune system hitting a low my ME was re-triggered.  This has been life changing for me, I have had to give up a job I love, my hobbies and can not always be there for my husband and children as much as I would like.  I spend my days trying to manage my illness once again while being there for my family.  I would love to be out running again but this is just not a possibility.  My lovely friends are running the 10k Christmas Cracker in order to raise money to support a fantastic charity.  I am so grateful to them and charities that support ME, one day treatment and a cure will be found to stop many others going through these life changes due to the illness.

Invest in ME Research is an independent UK charity finding, funding and facilitating a strategy of biomedical research into Myalgic Encephalomyelitis (ME or ME/CFS).The charity is run by volunteers - patients or parents of children with ME - with no paid staff.Overheads are kept to a minimum and all funds raised to go to promoting education of, and funding for biomedical research into, ME.Our efforts are focused on setting up a UK Centre of Excellence for ME which will provide proper examinations, diagnosis and in time treatment(s)/cure(s).