Sheffield Mum Runs 103 Miles For Children’s Cancer Ward!

Sheffield mum runs 103-miles for the Children’s Cancer Ward at Sheffield Children’s Hospital.

Three years and three months after her son Stan had been diagnosed with Leukaemia, Sheffield based mum, Julie Bembridge embarked on a 100-mile challenge to raise money for the children’s cancer ward, where her son had been treated. Running 103-miles in just 25 hours and 15 minutes, Julie gave her all to each mile as she had promised her son she would!

Speaking to Ultrarunner Magazine, Julie tells of her journey and discusses her reasons why in an incredible interview that truly touches the heart.

 In her own words …

When your child receives a diagnosis such as Leukaemia, as a parent, one of your first thoughts is, my child is going to die. Before you have the chance to talk with the professionals or even begin to try and understand and compartmentalise the disease and the treatments available, you are hit with the gut-wrenching idea that your child is going to slip away from you. As if you have been hit in the stomach with a brick, there is a horrendous sense of inescapable dread as you are catapulted into the most extreme dark place, hoping that your child will be one of the lucky ones who survive, yet at the same time, sick with fear that they won’t.

The day that my son, Stan was diagnosed there was no time wasted getting his treatment underway, we were ushered up to the ward in the hospital almost immediately and the doctors and nurses got to work providing outstanding care for him. As a family, we spent the next few days educating ourselves on the type of Leukaemia that Stan had and what options were out there. At the time, we felt relatively fortunate that for the kind that my son had, there were a number of different treatment options, and the prognosis was fairly good.

However, as anyone with a child will understand, no matter how positive the prognosis, nor how many survival stories that you read, without that 100% guarantee that your child is going to make it through to the other side, there is a constant, nagging doubt, that always finds a place to live in your mind, no matter how hard you try to stay above the darkness. The odds were in Stans favour but nevertheless, there was no promise of a full recovery and that was enough to eat me alive at times. I tried so incredibly hard to envision the best outcome but in the very early days I would get sideswiped with a black cloud of ‘what if?’.

As time goes on and the results come back, over and over again, showing signs of progression, the wheels of the rollercoaster start to slow, and rays of light begin to shine through the blackened tunnels. With each new set of results and with each piece of paper that proved my son was not only fighting this disease but fighting well, that cloud began to lift a little more each time and eventually I was able to keep on top of my thoughts and not become entirely consumed by that pit of fear.

In March of 2021, Stan finished his treatment, some three years, and three months after the initial diagnosis. My son has spent the last few years fighting for his survival and I am so incredibly proud of him and how he has handled this journey. What he has had to endure is harrowing and I am so pleased to say that he is doing really well now. Stan, and children like him, have to deal with so much, like severe exhaustion as their bodies fight the disease and try to cope with the treatments, more often than not feeling like absolute rubbish as their bodies swell due to the steroids. The leg pain meant that Stan could not run or play footie with his friends, he wasn’t living like a normal boy his age.

Now, however, Stan is like a brand-new lad, going to personal training a few times a week, looking fantastic and feeling great, he has his life back and that is down to the remarkable care and treatment that he received from Sheffield’s children’s hospital, they literally saved his life! I don’t have the words to vocalise my gratitude, I can’t explain how deeply, deeply thankful I am to them for saving my son and that is precisely why I decided to run 100-miles to help raise money for the refurbishment of ward 6 of the children’s hospital!