Rose's Story

It is an honour to introduce you to Rose in this email. 

Stories of inspirational women at the top of their game are hopefully flooding your feeds, on the eve of International Women's Day. 

This particular one is about a girl whose story is just beginning, but she's had to endure more than most adults could imagine. 

You're going to hear from her incredible mum, Charlotte, who has been a member of the Ladies Who Crunch community since December 2021. Charlotte and her husband, Richard, are running the London Marathon in April. 

Here's why...

We’re running the London Marathon 2025 for Solving Kids’ Cancer UK in honour of our daughter, Rose. Just before her first birthday, she was diagnosed with neuroblastoma, a rare childhood cancer.

She faced intense treatment with incredible strength. This charity supports families who have been impacted by neuroblastoma and funds vital research for better outcomes and kinder treatments. Running is our way of giving back and helping other families facing childhood cancer.

One of the biggest things I’ve realised is that every family's experience with cancer is different. For us, we made a conscious effort to focus on the positives where we could...The fact that Rose’s tumour was classed as ‘intermediate’ risk (high risk neuroblastoma treatment is incredibly long and tough)...That we lived so close to Great Ormond Street Hospital....That Rose has the most supportive, brilliant grandparents who dropped everything to be with us...That both our employers were understanding.We know that many families don’t have these advantages, and we will never take that for granted.

We also made a promise to each other early on: open, honest communication, without judgement. We gave each other permission to be honest about when we were feeling angry, sad or hopeful – even if the other was feeling the complete opposite.

Richard’s advice that he wanted to share is:

1) doctors and nurses are doing their best: they are kind, caring, and human. They are also overworked, so patience and understanding go a long way.

2) Lean on every resource available. This journey is incredibly tough, but a problem shared is a problem halved.

3) Kindness can sometimes feel overwhelming, but people truly mean well and want to help.

It’s such an unusual time; we found people being normal with us helped to take our mind off it the most.I actually treasure some of the memories I have of our families sitting with us whilst Rose was having her treatment and us all laughing about something silly my dad had done or my brother had said. We felt like one big team.

When you can’t physically be there, just offer to listen or rather than just offering to help, physically do it.People sent us loads of food parcels and I cannot tell you how helpful it was to crawl in from a long day at hospital and have a ready meal to throw in the oven.

I think the word resilience gets thrown around a lot, but there is nothing like seeing a group of children push their chemo trolleys around a playroom in hospital, finding some joy in something quite dark. It made me realise there is always a little bit of light if you look for it.

As for Rose, she will have scans every 3 months for the next 18 months and then hopefully we will move to 6 monthly scans and then yearly.But, apart from that hopefully the same life as most other little girls, but with just a few more scars!I don’t think she’ll remember her treatment, but we won’t shy away from telling her if she asks. We are so proud of her.

Show your support and sponsor Charlotte