"You never believe it will happen to you..."

In 2015 Natasha turned 30. That year, she (and Dominic) completed a two mile open water swim, achieved a sub two hour half marathon and cycled 310 miles from Newcastle to London, riding through the night to complete the challenge in just over 25 hours. And Natasha was diagnosed with cancer.

In December 2015, Natasha was diagnosed with stage III bowel cancer. She was 30 years old. She was fit. She lead a healthy lifestyle. Natasha is the embodiment of how indiscriminate this awful disease can be.

Since her diagnosis, Natasha has had surgery to remove the tumour and completed a six month course of chemotherapy. Despite the gruelling treatment regimen, Natasha (accompanied and encouraged by Dominic) continued to get out for short runs, dreaming of the endurance challenges they would complete once the nightmare was over.

"If you don't have a dream, how you gonna have a dream come true?"

One such dream was completing the London Marathon, the route for which runs past the bottom of the road where Dominic grew up in Greenwich. That dream is one step closer to becoming a reality as Bowel Cancer UK have accepted us onto their 2018 London Marathon Team.

Bowel Cancer UK’s work is entirely funded by money raised from donations and charitable giving. Their work includes raising awareness and funding lifesaving research. There's little doubt in our minds that their work contributed to Natasha's positive prognosis.

"Why on earth would you run a marathon?"

    "Because I can."

The road to recovery has been challenging. Finishing treatment in July 2016, physically depleted and emotionally drained, sport has been an essential therapy in the months since. 

Dominic and Natasha are looking forward to running their home marathon in support of a charity that means so much to them. Bowel Cancer UK's research and awareness raising has meant that our family’s experience of this dreadful disease has been a positive one. So many others are not so fortunate.

Please give as generously as you can afford so that others can be spared those life changing words "It's cancer"