In July 2016, my grandson Miller was born 3 months early, and he weighed just a little bit more than a bag of sugar.  He had to be resuscitated twice in his first 24 hours, and within a week he had undergone 2 major surgeries.  He was bombarded with a cocktail of medicines for many complications, and he pulled through. Our own little miracle.  He spent 3 months in the Special Care Baby Unit on Ward 35 at Newcastle RVI, and eventually came home pretty much exactly on his original due date. 

He is now a year old, and to look at him you really would have no idea  what he went through in those early days.  I still don’t know how Millers parents (my son Ian and his partner Brooke) held it together for the summer, but I know that without the support of NHS staff and the charities that work with Ward 35 there is no way they could have stayed with their special little man and that would have made it so much harder.  It was hard enough for my wife Mandy and I to travel to Newcastle from North Yorkshire every few days bringing endless supplies of clean clothes, food parcels and support for Ian and Brooke.

I walked the Great North Run last September.  My training didn’t go well with all that happening in our lives, so this year I have unfinished  business.  I am honoured to be running to raise funds for the Tiny Lives Trust – it’s my chance to say thank you for the amazing work they did for my family last summer.