Anyone who has ever played sports with me knows I absolutely despise running in any form, and anyone who knows me knows my dad is my best friend. So finding a challenge to raise money for a cancer charity very personal to him inevitably had to turn to running.

I vividly remember the 4th of October 2018. My mum had asked me to take the day off school to look after my 15-year-old brother Ethan, as he was having a routine operation in a local hospital (which went fine). She had to accompany my dad to Moorfields in London, where they were told, out of the blue, he had the very rare form of eye cancer, and the average prognosis (life expectancy) was five years for 50% of generally, 50–80-year-old, white-skinned, blue or green-eyed men and women the world over. I was 17 and knew my mother had lost her father when she was a similar age, albeit from a completely different form of cancer.

Following that, dad was treated with proton beam therapy, lost half the sight in his left eye, but fortunately didn’t require a prosthetic as so many do. This treatment ultimately stopped the tumour growth as I and Ethan were working on our A-Levels and GCSEs.

We carried on life as normally as possible, dad had 6 monthly monitoring scans of his liver as Ocular Melanoma has a habit, in 50% of people with the initial diagnosis, to metastasise to the liver, when it then becomes terminal. In September 2022, we were informed that this had happened, and he was now Stage IV with no way back. It's another day and another conversation that will forever be in my brain, held just after my auntie’s funeral. She had just died following another form of cancer, Lynch Syndrome, as had her 21-year-old son, our cousin, only 18 months earlier (cancer's a bitch).

I am forever grateful to Covid and my decision to undertake my undergraduate degree with the Open University, as I was able to spend time at home in Hertfordshire and abroad with dad more regularly than otherwise.

He had 25% of his liver removed to cut out the new tumours however they started to grow back almost immediately. His updated prognosis was 1-3 years from a professor specialising in Ocular Melanomas. That was Sep 22 and we have had our fingers crossed for every 3-month scan ever since.

From Day 1 back in 2018, mum and dad have spent a lot of time online and elsewhere, trying to find out about this rare cancer. One of the best sources of advice he has found has been from Ocular Melanoma UK and so it is this charity, my friends and I have elected to endure pain and raise money for this October. For my dad, they offer him access to an otherwise secret community of people in similar positions, seeing similar consultants and undergoing similar medical treatments with similar side effects, all living in hope of a cure being found in time for them. The Charity enables these people to meet each other and talk to others in the same situation, becoming more informed about the options available to them, albeit limited.

Dad is still fighting, attends the Royal Marsden once a week for immunotherapy and will do until the cancer ultimately beats the drug. He is still fit and active, enjoys daily morning yoga and kitesurfs pretty much every day he is able.

We have had some amazing family times over the past 7 years and make sure to hug each other a little bit tighter now.

Ocular Melanoma is a rare form of eye cancer, affecting about 500 new people in the UK every year and they have no idea of the cause. Ocular Melanoma UK is the only charity in the country dedicated to supporting people affected by this cancer. They provide reliable information, a friendly helpline, and online forums where patients and families can talk to others who understand what they are going through. Being a small charity, they get to know the people they support, building a community that reduces isolation and gives real hope.

Please donate what you can to support this charity, so people aren't left in the dark with this disease. If you would like to read more about the charity, please click here: https://omuk.org

If you'd like to come and support us on the day, we'd love to see you around the course and at the finish line. You might see me with both my knees strapped up, but we'll be in our matching outfits and are aiming to get around the course with good snacks and good vibes.