Hello everyone. 

This coming March I am going to be running Sheffield half marathon to raise money for Macmillan, a charity very close to mine and my families hearts, in memory of my father - Robert Palmer.

As many of you are aware my father was diagnosed with grade 4 brain cancer involving two tumours, one on each side of his brain in December 2019. Since his diagnosis he went through a long, emotional journey which consisted of brain surgery, radiotherapy and chemotherapy. For us, non of these options were successful and my father heartbreakingly passed away at the end of October. As I’m sure you can imagine doing my bit to support a charity so vital to the fight against cancer is incredibly important to me. 

A few weeks before dad passed, we found out that dad would no longer be receiving chemotherapy. This was due to the tumours not responding, thus he was put on end of life care. This resulted in nurses visiting the house up to 4x a day to give dad the support he needed as he was unable to carry out basic day-to-day tasks.

I want to run this race and raise money to a charity so close to mine, his and our families heart. Without Macmillan this challenge would have been so much harder. Before dad passed, I remember sitting by his bed at home and going through each and everyone of your donations and tears came to both of our eyes with how generous and grateful we were. So for that I want to say the biggest thank you from the bottom of my heart.

I personally began running again throughout lockdown as a means of keeping myself active and to distract myself from the situation at home and the worsening situation worldwide. I really felt like there was no better way for me to recognize the sacrifice of MacMillan volunteers and researchers than to challenge myself in a way I never thought possible; by running a half marathon. My goal is to raise £2500 to support these volunteers, I understand this is a tough time and donations probably aren’t at the top of anyone’s priorities but I’d really appreciate anything you can give to support this really amazing cause.