TRAVELLING away fans to Solihull Moors mid-week fixture with Kidderminster Harriers are getting their walking boots ready to raise funds for national blood cancer charity.
The 30 football fans from Worcestershire will be taking on the 32-mile walk on Tuesday (February 13) in a bid to raise £10,000 for Cure Leukaemia.
They will be walking in honour of fellow fan Tom Hudson’s daughter, Bella, who was diagnosed with Acute Lymphoblastic Leukaemia (ALL) in 2021 when she was eight years old.
Following her diagnosis Bella was transferred to Birmingham Children’s Hospital where she began a course of chemotherapy which would last for four months – only to receive the news that it wasn’t working.
However, much to the relief of Tom and his partner Bella’s treatment started working and she was eligible for a stem cell transplant.
He said: “We managed to get her home after the transplant, but I just knew that it was a poor graft – none of the new cells were kicking in and platelets weren’t working.”
Bella managed to fight it for another 12 months before she relapsed – and her parents were delivered the heartbreaking news that “this is probably it now” because the leukaemia had now morphed into the more aggressive Acute Myeloid Leukaemia (AML).
Bella is now eleven years old having spent her ninth, tenth and eleventh birthdays in hospital and is currently in remission.
Money raised from the walk will be invested in the national Trials Acceleration Programme (TAP) which has been solely funded by Cure Leukaemia.
The TAP Network is a network of specialist research nurses at 15 blood cancer centres located in the UK’s biggest cities.
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