Welcome to my fundraising page for CoppaFeel!

If you don't know me, I’m Emma. Mummy to George, wife to Tom, Paediatric Nurse. I'm also living life with advanced, stage 4 breast cancer, which developed during pregnancy & had spread to almost all of my bones & my liver by the time I was diagnosed in the summer of 2021. It may be considered incurable, but so is my optimism, hope & love of life.

This September I will set out on a challenging, extraordinary and life-changing trek, all in the name of checking chests! I will be taking on the a 5 day trek, hiking 8 hours a day across mountainous terrain in the French Alps, in a bid to raise funds towards CoppaFeel's life-saving mission.

I was lucky to be able to complete a fundraising hike last year. That was a huge challenge, but this is bigger. I haven’t done anything in this kind of altitude before, in fact I generally avoid hills! A week after we completed Race to the Stones last summer, I had an oophorectomy to remove my ovaries as my cancer is fed by oestrogen. The impact of this surgery has taken a huge toll on me & my fitness. I was thrown straight into a surgical menopause which has been pretty brutal, and significant fatigue is something I now deal with on a daily basis (thank goodness for George still napping so I can too!). 

Tom also practically carried me for the last part of our last trek, which won’t be happening this time as I’ve signed up solo. The women who will be trekking alongside me may be strangers at the start, but we’ve all been affected by breast cancer in some way, or are living with it as I am.

I appreciate that we were fortunate to receive such generous donations last year, so to ask again is an ask. Anything you can spare is appreciated. I just know that there is so much work to do & so I can’t stay quiet about it. Knowing the pain of such a late diagnosis, I would do anything to prevent someone else & their family going through the same. Had I been more confident in the changes I found in pregnancy I might have shouted louder when professionals dismissed me because I was ‘too young’ & didn’t have a strong family history.

Your donations will not only support my fundraising target, but most importantly CoppaFeel!. They are on a mission to stamp out the late diagnosis of breast cancer by making sure that young people are regularly checking their boobs, pecs and chests and getting to know their bodies in order to have the confidence to see their GP if something just doesn't feel normal.

CoppaFeel not only helps to raise awareness for everyone to check their chests, but also provides training for professionals, including midwives. This is key & what will help to save lives.

Thanks so much for your donation & support. To find out more about CoppaFeel! head to www.coppafeel.org.