**Update 8 Jan 23**

Hannah Hayward, another good friend, has volunteered to join our team to run the marathon.

Hannah heard about mine and Woody's mission to raise money in memory of Ellison by running on 23 Apr, and wanted to help. She is a long-standing Army Air Corps friend; highly-regarded at work and with a heart of gold.  

Her participation raises our collective target to £7,500.

Leigh Woodhouse (Woody) and I are running the London Marathon on 23 April 2023, to raise money for the Bone Cancer Research Trust.

My son, Ellison James Knightly Dawes, died on 3 Feb 2021 after battling Ewing’s Sarcoma, a rare form of bone cancer. He was diagnosed in April 2020 and fought with the utmost bravery through 9 months of aggressive cancer treatment. 

I frequently look for the words to describe those 9 months and life since, but I can't. Physically, my stomach feels like a ball of concrete being twisted and twisted, and I experience overwhelming moments of dread that the world continues on without him in it. But Ellison never complained about his cancer, asking only once ‘why is this happening to me?’. He faced his illness not just bravely, but with patience and grace – even teaching me along the way that I needed to be kinder to the doctors and nurses, when I became frustrated that they weren’t curing him quickly enough. 

During his last month, he read a story about a little boy whose sister was ill and an angel called Skellig cures her. Ellison asked his teacher, during one of his final zoom calls before he became too ill for school work, why an angel couldn’t come and save him. 

A cure for this appalling disease needs to be found, to ensure that stories like Ellison’s become a thing of the past. The BCRT’s research into bone cancer is the first step. Supporting this charity is like capturing a little bit of the spirit of Skellig. By running for The Bone Cancer Research Trust I want to stop other parents losing their child to this evil disease. I want others to have the chance of living.

Woody agreed to run the marathon with me to raise money for the BCRT, after a long conversation about Ellison and that I was always planning to run the marathon but never committed. He knew that by volunteering himself, I would step up and run. 

The Bone Cancer Research Trust is dedicated to saving lives & improving outcomes for people affected by primary bone cancer. Despite being small, they fund more research projects exploring primary bone cancer than any other organisation. Other large UK cancer research charities do not prioritise bone cancer patients, in 2019 just 0.028% of their research spend went to bone cancer – not even close to 1%!Last year alone, Bone Cancer Research Trust committed an incredible £807,824 to pioneering bone cancer research - to save lives!