Run for Your Life is the story of how I kept running through treatment for breast cancer and beyond. It was published in January 2017 by Pitch Publishing and you can download the first couple of chapters from their website, or order it from Bookshop.org, Waterstones or from other online bookshops. It was based on my blog, and you can find links to my original posts at the bottom of this page.
This is what Run Mummy Run had to say about the book:
‘Run for your life is an emotional and inspiring read. You will wonder at Jenny’s strength and be moved by how deeply she is cared for by her friends and family, especially when they join her on her “Chemo runs”. Most of all through this book will leave you with a sense of hope. Jenny uses a quote in the book that speaks to her from Lemn Sissay – poet, writer and playwright “I am not defined by my scars, but by the incredible ability to heal. You have to live in the present, not the past or in the future”. This book is definitely testament to her ability to do this.’
The i news has published an extract from the book and there are articles about the book in the Daily Mirror, the Sunday Post, and in The Sun on London Marathon day.
I’ve written about my experience for Huffington Post and the Running Physio and Ealing Half Marathon have done a great press release about it that got picked up by run Britain and others.
I’ve been featured in the print versions of Outdoor Fitness and Adventure, Like the Wind, Runners World and Running magazine.
There are reviews of the book on the Biblomaniac blog, on Run Mummy Run and one in the Southern Running Guide.
I’m hoping the book will be helpful to women facing a breast cancer diagnosis, to their friends and family who want to know how to support them, indeed to anyone struck by the cancer thunderbolt. But I also think it will be of interest to everyone who runs. It explores how I got into running, how running became part of my identity, why I’ve run in Palestine, how running builds resilience and makes you stronger in so many ways.
Here are links to my blog posts about cancer to make it easier to find them. It’s not a blow-by-blow account of exactly what happened when, more how I felt and what I was thinking as I went through it all.
Diagnosis
Not what I had planned | Another kind of marathon | Amsterdam | A poem for this year
Chemotherapy
Coming up for air | Losing my hair | Welcome to the club | Rediscovering writing | Run for your life | Guardian running blog | Not fighting but training | Running with… | Senza mozzarella | Essential kit | One more mile | On sorrow and self-pity | In praise of parkrun | Lizzy Hawker: Runner | Five down, one to go | Building a den | Last lap | Becoming a grandma | A time to be and to endure
Surgery and recovery
Onto the next stage | One week on | Time on my hands | What do you do to play? | Practicing | T2 | Like the Wind magazine | Beloved | How to help |
Radiotherapy
Coming to an end | My running year – 2015 | 50 while I’m 50 | Weary but done
Moving on
Getting myself back | Living hopefully |Moving on | Keeping watch | Bodily knowledge | Step off the path you know | Growing back | Summer in a sleeve |
Run for your life 