My Story

Thanks for taking the time to visit my Enthuse page for my 2024 London Marathon.

I'm running the London Marathon in support of Versus Arthritis. Millions of people wake up every morning and struggle to do daily tasks like making a cup of tea or walking down the stairs. This needs to change, and with the right support and fundraising, we have a chance. 

My battle with Arthritis started at 19 with a footballing injury (although at the time we didn't know it was arthritis), the ball hit my right wrist and at that moment my life changed. At the time I was a Professional footballer at Leeds United, so luckily had the access to best treatments available. The next three years were filled with a lot of MRI's, steroid injections, meetings with specialists and pain. At times the pain was manageable, but these windows of being painfree were getting shorter and shorter after each injection. 

During COVID simple acts like lifting a kettle, throwing a ball or doing a press-up became impossible, it was debilitating and as a very sporty guy quite hard to live through. I even had to teach myself to play tennis left handed (not pretty). 

In the May of 2022 I found out that I needed surgery. This happened to be an ulnar shortening and key-hole surgery to clean up the arthritis in my wrist. 

Two and a half years later, I can do a press-up, lift the kettle and do most of the things I used to be able to do. I'm not a Professional footballer anymore, whether things might have been different - we will never know.

What I do know is that I wouldn't want anyone to have to expereince the pain and suffering that I went through. With your donations we can make a difference to poeple's lives and help to support them through tough times. 

As a bonus you'll get to witness me struggle through a 26 mile run!

Thanks for taking the time read this post

Cheers,

Will