Inspiration

Sadly, my grandfather passed away last Monday after a year of battling with MND (Motor Neurone Disease). He was diagnosed with the disease on the 16th November last year and battled through until the 17th November this year. He showed such determination to fight the disease, still heading to rugby matches each Saturday and visiting his family - so much determination putting anything I could do to shame. He gradually lost his speech and function in his fingers and it must have been so frustrating for him to have lost virtually all forms of communication but he still smiled. He only had one night in hospital during the year and that was last Sunday. He was determined to get back home on the Monday and he managed to step into the porch of his home before he collapsed on my Dad. He lost conciousness, stopped breathing and once resuscitated he was put on life support in the hospital. My gran asked for the life support to remain on until my uncle arrived from Stirling (about 2 hours drive away). I think Granda must have heard that as he waited until my uncle arrived, waited until my uncle came and said his goodbye and then died of his own accord about a minute later. The funeral was on Friday and although we were all very upset as strange as it sounds it was a really nice day allowing us to remember good memories of granda.
Since coming back to Oxford on Sunday night it has given me a renewed drive for my training. I suppose I feel if Granda had the determination to fight MND the least I could do is have more determination for my training. Related to all this I have set myself a new goal... to run a marathon. I am aiming to hopefully run the New York Marathon next year to raise money for MND. I feel this would be a fitting tribute to my Granda, especially as it is something sporty. This obvioulsy depends on me going to America, but if I stay here I will try and run the London Marathon.
So my training has stepped up a gear - if I'm going to run it in a year's time I obviously need to get much fitter. On Monday I went running with Nicole in the morning for around 4.5km and then went swimming with Steph and Paul in the evening. On Tuesday morning me and Paul went to the gym to start the weights again and then this lunchtime I went for a 45 minute run to Kidlington and back running over 7.5km. I am really enjoying the exercise and I am feeling a lot better for it. Lets hope I can keep it up!