Hi!

TLDR: I'm running a half marathon and asking for sponsorship on behalf of a friend who tragically lost her young son and has since been fundraising for Great Ormond Street Hospital. If you can contribute a few pounds/dollars it would be greatly appreciated.

Despite spending most of my adult life working in do-goody organisations I've only ever asked for sponsorship twice. The first time was for a charity hitch-hike to Morocco while at university. On that hitch I met Emily Wise (now Shaw), who is the driving force behind this particular fundraising effort. I've copied below some text from her describing in more detail the situation that led her to seek funding for the Great Ormond Street Hospital. Needless to say, it's a very worthy cause and a very personal one for her. Any contribution you can make will be truly valued. 

As for the half-marathon, I am wholly unprepared, but looking forward to painfully (and embarrassingly slowly) hauling myself through the streets of London in service of a good cause. I will of course also be contributing to this cause myself. 

From Emily:

James William Shaw was born on 21st September 2016, followed three minutes later by his sister Isabel. Both twins were thriving at home, our 18-month old Alexa was just beginning to understand that she was an older sister and my husband, Pete, and I were excitedly looking to the future with as a family of five. Then, at just 5.5 weeks old Jimmy became suddenly, unexpectedly and devastatingly unwell with presumed sepsis (an uncontrolled infection) and a complicating blood clot to his bowel. Despite the determined efforts of our local hospital, the Children's Acute Transfer Service (CATS) and ultimately Great Ormond Street Hospital Intensive Care Unit, Jimmy could not be saved. He died in our arms two days after becoming unwell, covered in the kisses of his mummy and daddy, who told him how loved he was. It is beyond words how traumatised we were left by seeing Jimmy so desperately sick and how bereft his death left us, our hearts were truly broken. Then, three weeks after Jimmy died, and just two days after we had buried him, his twin sister Izzy too became unwell with an unrelated condition, we were just seemingly that unlucky. Within 24 hours Izzy was undergoing emergency, life-or-death surgery at Great Ormond Street. We genuinely believed we were going to lose a second child that day. Thankfully Izzy's surgery was successful and she recovered.

I am a hospital doctor and I can hand-on-heart honestly say that in my 11 years experience as a clinician I have never seen such a unanimous, continuous and determined effort and bloody-minded resolve to save a life as with Jimmy. The medical staff gave blood, sweat and tears to save my little boy, he received the best possible care in the world, by the most humane doctors and nurses I have ever met and for that I am beholden to them. Beyond the world-class care both he and Izzy received at GOSH, our family received unbounded care and kindness, practical support (such as neighbouring accommodation) and pastoral support that continues to this day (including bereavement counselling). GOSH gave us our very best hope of saving Jimmy, saved the life of Izzy and took extremely delicate and humane care of us parents in the process.

Very soon after these experiences we became resolved on trying to repay some of our perceived incalculable debt to GOSH, nurture something positive out of such a tragic loss and continue to strive to keep Jimmy’s memory alive. We are pulling together an army of impossibly loyal family and friends to join us in fundraising a hugely ambitious amount for GOSH, specifically in Jimmy’s name, as his legacy. We need to raise £107,649 to buy two much needed new ventilators for their CATS ambulance service. Please donate what you can, share our story and let us know if you too would like to fundraise in Jimmy's name by emailing us on littlejimmybrighterfuturefund@gmail.com.

Love and gratitude from Emily, Pete, Lexy and Izzy Shaw xx

Okay, that's it. Let me know if you have any questions, and I'll let you know how it goes on Sunday! 

Many thanks for your support. 

Matt xx

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