On Saturday 10th October 2026, I will be running 57 miles from Glasgow to Edinburgh to raise money and awareness in support of the incredible NHS staff and hospital teams who helped save my daughter Avanna’s life.

Avanna was born via Caesarean section with a gestation of 39+1 on 22.08.2026 (National Angel Day) at Queen Victoria Hospital in Kirkcaldy. What should have been the happiest moment of our lives quickly turned into every parent’s worst nightmare. Shortly after birth, she was diagnosed with ‘wet lung’ and required resuscitation as she was struggling to breathe. She was transferred to the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit, where she was placed on CPAP, but despite receiving 100% oxygen, her condition continued to deteriorate and she was unable to maintain her oxygen levels.

It soon became clear that Avanna was also battling life-threatening sepsis, which had begun affecting her organs and her recovery. She was placed on a breathing ventilator, but her condition remained critical. The specialist retrieval team at ScotSTAR transferred her for advanced treatment, including high-frequency oscillator ventilation and inhaled nitric oxide to support her lungs. Avanna was then transferred to Royal Hospital for Children in Glasgow as a potential ECMO candidate. ECMO is a life-saving form of heart and lung support that acts as an artificial heart and lung outside the body, giving critically ill patients a chance to recover. By this point, Avanna had been diagnosed with severe respiratory failure, and the pressure in her lungs had begun to affect her heart’s ability to function properly. Her condition was critical, and she required intensive specialist care to keep her alive while her body fought to heal.

For the first two weeks of her life, she was heavily sedated and paralysed to give her tiny body the best chance to heal. During this time, she underwent countless procedures and treatments, including blood transfusions, body scans, umbilical lines, cannulas, feeding tubes and multiple medications that ultimately helped save her life.

Although she narrowly avoided the need for ECMO, she remained critically ill and continued to require oscillatory ventilation and nitric oxide therapy for around two weeks where she gradually grew stronger each day. Eventually, Avanna was well enough to be transferred back to Kirkcaldy, where she finally began to wake up, move around, and learn how to feed and breathe independently. Watching her open her eyes and start to thrive after everything she had endured was nothing short of miraculous.

Our daughter Avanna, has a name with a meaning we only truly came to appreciate after everything she went through. Her name can be broken down into Ava and Anna. Ava means “to live or to breathe” and, “gift of life”, while Anna means gracious. Together, her name can be translated as “God’s gracious gift of life.” Looking back at those frightening days when she struggled to breathe and fought for survival in intensive care, the meaning of her name feels incredibly fitting. Today, seeing her healthy, happy and thriving reminds us every day just how precious that gift truly is. Today, Avanna is our little miracle that brightens up each and every day with her infectious smiles and belly giggle laughs.

Every mile of this 57-mile journey from Glasgow to Edinburgh is to give something back for Avanna, to the NHS heroes who saved her life, and for every family facing a similar battle. What began as the darkest chapter of our lives has become a story of hope, resilience and gratitude every single day.

Any donation, no matter how big or small, will help support the incredible work these teams do for critically ill babies and their families. Thank you for helping us celebrate Avanna’s journey and support those who make miracles like hers possible. All funds donated go directly from the Just Giving page to the neonates fund within Glasgow Children’s Hospital Charity.

Thank you for helping us honour the extraordinary doctors, nurses, retrieval teams and specialists whose expertise, dedication and compassion gave our daughter Avanna the chance to live and to breathe every single day as her name so beautifully represents.