Thank you for finding your way to our fundraising page!

On the 21st April 2013 we will be running 26.2 miles in the London marathon, raising money for Shooting Star Chase hospice. This is a wonderful children's hospice with two locations in Surrey which provides services for children with life limiting conditions, who are not expected  to reach their 19th birthday.

The hospice has a very dear place in our hearts as it became our family home and much much more last year, during the worst time of our lives when our precious baby, Owen, was discharged from Paediatric Intensive Care on palliative / end of life care.

We had initially decided to bring Owen home for his end of life. Nurses from the hospice came out to us everyday to ensure Owen was comfortable, oversee his medication and change the medication in his syringes. And to ensure that we were coping with looking after our very poorly little boy.

After we had looked after Owen at home for 2 weeks we were utterly exhausted, physically, mentally and most of all, emotionally. We were struggling with the 1-2 hourly medications, day and night, not feeling that we were maintaining Owens pain control and watching our beautiful child deteriorate before our eyes.

We told our older son, Theo, that we were going to go for a little 'holiday' where we could bring Owen with us and all stay together. We told him to pack his swimming shorts as there is a swimming pool at 'the holiday house' plus soft play, playground, trampoline, sandpit and loads of toys!

We didn't really know what to expect at the hospice. We hadn't had any experience of a hospice before, let alone a children's hospice. I remember our first evening when we arrived, the nurses got straight on top of his medication, after tactfully asking if it was ok for them to do so - had we wanted to stay in charge, that was fine too. We got Owen settled into a comfortable cot with a sheepskin to prevent bedsores and were about to take shifts going for dinner when the nurses told us Owen's cot was on wheels so we could all go to the dining room together, where all meals were cooked for us alongside the other families and staff. Little touches like this meant the world to us. To know we didn't have to leave Owen was a big deal! After dinner the nurses showed us to our family flat where Zander, Anna and Theo could stay. First they took Theo to choose some bed linen - a dinosaur set was chosen with much glee. That first night we stayed up in the flat and the nurses had Owen at their station. After that, Anna regularly slept down with Owen in his room to stay near him and the nurses were happy to accommodate this.

Our little warrior, Owen, lived a lot longer than anyone had anticipated and we stayed at Chase for 2 months until he passed away in his mummy's arms surrounded by his family. We were all looked after so well and became very close to the nurses and staff there.

During our time staying at the hospice we got to see a lot of what else goes on in a children's hospice. Respite for families caring full time for sick children with very complex needs, family fun days, swimming sessions in a pool specifically designed for disabled children, counselling for families dealing with the stress of knowing their child will die and bereavement counselling, music and pet therapy. All the family is supported, with weekends away and play sessions for siblings, plus grandparent bereavement groups.

You hope to never need a service like a children's hospice and whilst the NHS is a wonderful healthcare service, sometimes children fall through the gaps of medicine and there is sadly no cure. In these instances, the worst time any family could imagine, the services provided by hospices like Shooting Star Chase are invaluable. These hospices get very little or more often no government funding, so please dig deep and sponsor us today!!