Hewstone Daddy-Daughter Duo Take On Rome

Rome, 10.04.2016

We made it, and brilliantly! 4.10 hrs for Rebecca, 4.16 for Miles!

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We are a team -- a strange team, perhaps? But we hope that may make you pause, and think, and then donate to this excellent cause.

One of us, Miles, is a 59 year old father and Professor of Social Psychology at the University of Oxford. The other, Rebecca, is his 24 year old daughter, and a civil servant, currently working in Brussels.

We ran our first marathon, and also our first one together, 2 years ago in London; and we raised a large amount of money for a cancer charity. This time we are running the Rome Marathon 2016 together, in support of another good cause: the project of Gruppo Eventi in favour of bereaved children and teenagers. You can read more about the work of this charity below.

Please help Gruppo Eventi by supporting us - we will feel your support over the 42.2 km, which will surely feel tough at times; please help us to keep going, knowing that all our efforts will go to help this important cause.

And - for the sadist out there - we can confirm that this time we will be running our race separately. This is to ensure that 100% of the pain that one might expect when running a marathon is experienced by both in full (although Rebecca stresses that considerable pain was in fact endured by her in London, as evidenced by the significant loss of toes nails...).

N.B. The donation is in euros not in pounds..

Something about “Gruppo Eventi – Sostegno e Formazione” and its project:

There is very little help in Italy for bereaved children and teenagers. So, since last year, Gruppo Eventi has been building - in collaboration with FILE, a foundation providing end of life care - “soli ma insieme”, an interactive website dedicated to bereaved children and teenagers, the first in Italy to be ever set up. Part of the website (online in March 2016) is aimed at relatives and teachers. Gruppo Eventi is raising funds for the running of the website and for the setting up of other forms of f2f support. 

The charity was set up in 1996 to discuss and investigate the themes of end of life care, death and bereavement. It has organized seminars, meetings and workshops and published three books. Since the end of the '90ies Gruppo Eventi  has become active in the field of bereavement support with the setting up of support groups for the bereaved and training for the facilitators. The website (www.gruppoeventi.it) also aims at promoting a culture of help and knowledge about bereavement: it contains a large range of information and  testimonials about bereavement and support after a loss. Since 2005 Gruppo Eventi has also set up online support groups for specific types of losses (loss of a child, loss through suicide, bereaved siblings). Since 2015 the charity has become an aps, an association for social promotion: Gruppo Eventi Sostegno e Formazione. It is the main non governmental organization active in Italy on the theme of bereavement. The majority of the people engaged in Gruppo Eventi are psychologist and psychotherapists.

IN ITALIANO

Siamo una squadretta – forse un po' strana? - ma speriamo che proprio questo catturi la vostra attenzione, vi faccia riflettere e poi donare a questa ottima causa.

Uno di noi, Miles, è un padre di 59 anni e Professore di Psicologia Sociale all'Università di Oxford. L'altra, Rebecca, è sua figlia: 24 anni, dipendente del governo britannico, lavora a Bruxelles. Due anni fa, a Londra, abbiamo corso la nostra prima maratona insieme e siamo riusciti a raccogliere moltissime donazioni per una onlus impegnata sul tema del cancro.

Questa volta invece correremo la Maratona di Roma 2016 in sostegno di un'altra buona causa. Il progetto del Gruppo Eventi è molto importante: perchè bambini e ragazzi in lutto possano riprendere con fiducia e speranza il loro cammino di crescita dopo la perdita di una persona cara, devono essere accompagnati e sostenuti, aiutati a esprimere emozioni e difficoltà, a esplorare le loro risorse interne ed esterne.

Per favore aiutate Gruppo Eventi sostenendo noi: sentiremo il vostro sostegno lungo ognuno di quei 42.195 km, alcuni dei quali saranno a volte davvero duri.

Aiutateci ad arrivare alla fine della maratona con la consapevolezza che il nostro sforzo andrà a sostegno di una buona causa.