Why walk 500 miles when you can run 500 miles?! That’s exactly what full-time military nurses Megan Muirhead and Lydia Nowak are doing right now – and they’re on course to run the distance back home to Scotland inside their target time of three months.
Megan and Lydia are currently based at Derriford Hospital, and – to coin another classic song – they didn’t get to drive home for Christmas because COVID-19 restrictions would have allowed them just one day with family and friends. So, they came up with the idea of getting spiritually closer to home at least, by running the 500 miles while at the same time raising money for St Luke’s Hospice. Last year, the hospice cared for over 1,980 people in the local community living with a life-limited illness. But it needs £7.8 million a year to maintain its services.
Megan, from Glasgow, and Lydia, from Edinburgh, began their challenge on 1 April and gave themselves until 30 June to complete their run. They are almost two-thirds of the way there, and halfway to reaching their £2,000 fundraising target.
Megan is with the Royal Navy, while Lydia is a nurse with the RAF. They can be sent anywhere at any time to support the Armed Forces but keep their skills up by being attached to an NHS hospital. Megan has been based at Derriford for four years, and Lydia 18 months. Both are very aware of St Luke’s work, having been involved with patient referrals and palliative care: “The work they do is outstanding,” said Megan. “The emotional turmoil they’ve gone through during COVID, when you think they couldn’t see their own families … we are just in awe of their work.
“We came up with the idea in February of running 500 miles,” added Megan, “and yes, we’ve had a lot of Proclaimers jokes about that – and because we started it on April Fool’s Day! And then I started to read about St Luke’s and how they weren’t able to do their fundraising events last year because of COVID. So we thought, let’s use the 500 mile run to raise money for them.”
The pair are having to get their miles in where and when they can, as both have been so busy at work. Megan has spent a good part of this year helping the vaccination roll-out across the UK and is now working on Lynher Ward at Derriford. Lydia is currently on duty at the Medical Assessment Unit.
Running 250 miles each in the little spare time they have is even more of an achievement given that neither has done much running before. It’s not always a barrel of laughs either, with all the wet and windy weather we’ve had. But, said Megan: “I consider myself lucky that I am able to do this. I bet those people in the hospice would do anything to go for a run. And I watched a video that St Luke’s made, Tom’s Story, which was heart-wrenching. That’s my motivation for getting out and running.”
Colleagues are doing their bit to help, too: “I’ve not been here that long, so the running has been a good way for me to get to know Plymouth,” said Lydia, “and I’ve discovered some great little bakeries! But some days, the only chance I get to run is on the journey home at the end of my shift, and that’s made possible by my colleagues taking my bags home for me while I run back. Basically, we run when we can.”
At the time of writing, the two friends had clocked up 307.4 miles between them, which means they’ve just arrived in Manchester – nearly home, albeit only virtually! “At the moment, we are on course to smash our deadline,” said Lydia. “Proclaimers, eat your heart out!”
You can donate via their ‘Hoofin it for St Luke’s’ page on the Go Fund Me website and follow their progress on their Instagram page.
Writte by Laura Joint on behalf of #OnePlymouth
