About me

I didn’t know it at the time, but running was going to become a big part of my life.

Throughout my life, I have struggled with my mental health. This reached breaking point when I was 19. Whilst at university in Boston, I was sat alone in my room, with a knife, then a friend walked in on me. The details here do not matter, but today, I’m still thankful that they walked in at that moment. A decision was soon made for me that I would be safer if I left university, return home and start counselling. I was diagnosed with depression and ADHD, placed on a cocktail of drugs, and told to crack on with life.

Let’s return to the start of 2016; I was overweight, I drank a lot, my diet was crap, everything I did was in an effort to escape my head. The problem was, everything I was doing, just made me feel worse, yet I couldn’t see it, and around in a loop we went.

My sister introduced me to parkrun, “come run 5k they said, it’ll be fun they said!” – The only saving grace from the first parkrun was the coffee and cake afterwards. Ok, if I get coffee and cake after a run, I’ll put myself through it… the bug was beginning to take hold.

At the time, watching my grandmother suffer with dementia, I wanted to do something. I can’t cure dementia, but I could raise money to help fight dementia. This is where I discovered that I’m the type of person that’ll go big or go home – so in Feb 2016, I entered the ballot for the Royal Parks Half Marathon, (and for back up, a more local Half Marathon which was the week after RPHM.) I thought I wouldn’t get into RPHM, So was a little shocked when I got a place. I now had 6 months to go from 5k, up to 21k (twice!)

I now had targets, I had goals, I had something to work towards. I would routinely turn up to parkrun every Saturday. In March 2016 I entered my first 10k race. Awesome, we are building! This race vibe is quite addictive!

In April 2016, my sister was running the London Marathon, so I went along to support her on route. We agreed that we would appear somewhere near the half way point. Standing on Tower Bridge, I felt something inside, the atmosphere gripped me, the bridge bounced up and down as the runners crossed, the noise was incredible, but inside my head, I could clearly hear my thoughts, it was almost like the volume of the cheering had been turned down, runners went past in slow motion, yet one sentence repeated in my head – “I want to do this…”

We all know the chances of entering the London Ballot, so without further thought, I just entered it and went back to focusing on my half marathons.

The Royal Parks Half was my first experience of a big scale race. Large numbers of runners, cheering crowds, incredible atmosphere. I was enjoying every second of it! For the first time in a long time, my head was calm and I felt good! I couldn’t wait for the next one!

Two half marathons later, and a total of £2000 raised for the Alzheimer’s Society, I was wondering what was next… that question was swiftly answered as the London Marathon Magazine landed – “You’re In”

I looked at the cover of that magazine for a good 5 minutes, I didn’t quite believe this was happening. Not sure if I was excited or just shit scared at the thought of 42km…. One thing was clear, I had another target to shoot for, I now had another 6 months to prepare for my first marathon.

And here is where I feel I really began my journey. I had discovered running, I had goals, I had targets, I had a hobby, but most of all, I had a reason to live. This is my therapy, this is why I’m Running to Feel.