London Marathon 2018

21.04.18

Off to London again!!

The last time I was in London was just before my transplant and it took soooo long for me to get from the platform into the station, I had to stop several times and it was reslly painful. It was so incredible to walk up the platform and feel no pain just over a month later!

Saturday

We arrived on Saturday and I spent the day on Oxford street with Victoria, but we got off the bus at the wrong end! So instead of being near Selfridges we were right up the other end. But it was too hot to shop anyway, we sat in a nice park for lunch and then Victoria headed off to meet the rest of my family. Because my immune system is so weak, the tube is not the best place for me, so luckily I have family that live in Paddington and I got the bus to stay with them.

It took me forever to get to the bus because it was right down the other end of Oxford street, for anyone who doesn't know, Oxford street is 1.2 miles long! Although my legs were shattered I wasn't out of breath which was amazing, but I was melting in the heat! I finally got to Paddington, had some dinner and a catch up so it was lovely!

My dad is running the marathon for Cardiomyopathy UK and I've been excited for months! It's strange because if I hadn't had my op by now there's no way I'd have been able to come to London, I wouldn't have been able to walk at all and I was having multiple naps a day!

I was worried about the standing at the marathon because even though my walking is now much better, I struggle to stand for long periods of time due to the lack of muscle in my legs, they get very achy and weak and then physically shake when they've truly had enough! So I emailed the lady from Cardiomyopathy UK who is the event organiser and runs the Facebook page just asking whether I'd be allowed to bring a chair to sit on and where the cheering stands are so that I could plan my day. She emailed me back saying that they get allocated Grand Stand tickets and she'd saved me two!!

The Grand Stand is right at the finish line and it's seated which is amazing! All my fear went and I was just so excited then for the day!

Sunday

I got dropped off at St James's station where Ciaran met me and we walked to the Grand Stand! It was quite a trek due to roads being shut off for the race so we had to go all the way around rather than just going down one road, but we got there, had our bags checked and sat down. We got there for around 9:30am as I was told that it gets really busy at lunchtime and I wanted to make sure we had a seat. It was still quite quiet but there were a few people there to watch the wheelchair race and the elite runners, so we got to watch Mo Farah run across the finish line which was amazing!

Me and Ciaran spent the day chatting, snacking and cheering on the runners, it's such a wonderful day out. It's amazing to see so many ordinary people achieve their goal that they've trained months and to see them strain themselves so much to raise money for charities. I believe it reached 25 degrees in London that Saturday and it was so hard for the runners, many didn't make it to the finish line and one man sadly lost his life (you can find his just giving page here: https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/mattcampbell-londonmarathon).

I called my dad while he was halfway around and he said his feet were on fire and he was really struggling, but I told him to take it easy, we weren't going anywhere until he'd finished! We could follow him on the London Marathon app which is really cool, and Emily and her family were at Tower Bridge waiting for him to run past, so he had some fans to cheer him on!

It's a very emotional day, I cried for so many people, whether it was a message on their top, their family cheering from the Grand Stand as people ran to the finish or the poor people who's bodies gave up 100 meters from the end and had to be carried across. There's a real sense of unity on a day where everyone is actually running for separate causes and reasons, they all want each other to do well and enjoy the day.

Then the wonderful Tom Carney came running down the final stretch, it looked like a breeze. I think I looked more sweaty and red from my walk down Oxford street the day prior! He had a huge smile and we got to watch him cross over the finish, it was so exciting!

It was such a long walk back to where we were meeting up with everyone from the charity, we obviously couldn't cut across to the other side of the race track so we had to walk all the way around past all the meet and greet stands but we finally go there, with very sore hamstrings by this point! I met the lovely Danielle that organised the tickets for me and got to thank her and have a drink. Our train was booked for 7:30pm so we couldn't stay long but my dad had a shower and freshened up and we headed to Euston (in a taxi as my legs had had enough haha).

Despite having sore legs, I wasn't even tired the day after the marathon, in fact, I was up at the crack of dawn because I was in clinic for a biopsy. It really helped my confidence, I was always scared when I was ill of going to places because when I got tired it's a different kind of tired to what most people get, it gets to a point where I couldn't physically pick my feet up because my heart wouldn't pump blood to them. I wouldn't be able to talk because I didn't have enough blood getting to my brain and I'd fall asleep wherever I was (I've had many naps in the car!) So it was nice to be forced to walk a lot and realise that I no longer get that type of tiredness.

I want to take this chance to thank every one that sponsored my dad for the marathon, it really means so much to us! And anyone who would still like to sponsor us you still can on our Virgin Money page: https://uk.virginmoneygiving.com/Team/CardiomyopathyUK

Next weekend is my dad's wedding in Ireland, and I cannot wait now that I've tackled London!