All about me!

 Hello and Welcome to my Blog.

I'm Jaja and I live in a tiny village in East England although I am originally from the East London/Essex area.

I like running, cycling, hiking, weight-training, camping, travelling especially in the UK and Italy, but I'm still a lazy person at heart so I also like reading, particularly history.

To sum up my ability level at all these things I'd say "Slow but determined" or to paraphrase the late, great running coach, Cliff Temple: "37 years of running has turned me from a slow 20 year old to a slow 57 year old". 

But I've done 273 road races, including two London Marathons plus 2 swimathons (5000m); 54 cycle races/time trials/sportives; and 96 multisports events (triathlons, aquathlons and duathlons).  I did my first triathlon in 1993, long before it got trendy (I would have done in 1992 if a twit of a taxi-driver hadn't had ignored the stop line and wiped me off my bike and dislocated my shoulder).

I've also hiked the South West Coast Path (630 miles) twice; the Norfolk and Suffolk coast paths; Pembrokeshire Coast Path; the Essex Way; the Clock Carrier's Way in the Black Forest in Germany; the Painters Way in Essex and a home made route across Devon which we called Lyn & Sid (as it went from Lynmouth to Sidmouth) - and I've done the Peddars Way by Mountain Bike.

Guttingly, in 2019, I was within five days of doing the Orwell challenge, a trail marathon near Ipswich, when I was struck down with a nasty virus and never got to take part. The virus then lingered so long that I didn't get to do any other cross-country marathon either and then I went to the USA and began the latest round of the arrhythmia saga....(more on that later)

At the moment I'm slower than ever because of the heart arrhythmias which have landed me in A&E nine or ten times, including five cardioversions (electric shock which stops the heart and restarts it back in proper rhythm) and two cardiac ablations (where they burn the inside of the heart to try and stop the rogue electrical signals which cause the arrhythmias).

Since my forties I have also been aware that I inherited the rare genetic disorder, Hereditary Haemorrhagic Telancgiectesia  (HHT), which mainly causes nosebleeds in my case.  I've had a further four procedures for that too! I'll write about that little beasty in another post.

So the point of this Blog is really just because I enjoy writing, but also because I could not find much about people like me - slow, but keen.  Fit, but ill.  And no athletes (I use the term loosely, obviously) with HHT.  So just maybe someone somewhere might find this useful....

And that's  me




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