Friends put best foot (From Warrington Guardian)

Friends put best foot

forward...to Villa Park

TWO friends are walking 110 miles from the Reebok Stadium in Bolton to Villa Park in Birmingham to raise money for a cancer charity.

Bolton Wanderers' FC fanatics Andrew Gartside and Chris Eyres set off last Monday, as the result of a throwaway remark before this season's football fixtures were announced.

They decided that they should walk to the first away game of the season to raise money for CANtreat.

Andrew, 20, of Reedgate Lane, Crawley, near Antrobus, was diagnosed with cancer just before Christmas and is being accompanied by Chris, 54, of Cogshall Lane in Antrobus.

It was when he was on holiday in Australia and the Far East that Andrew, whose father is Bolton Wanderers' chairman Phil Gartside, started to get stomach pains, which increased in severity for around four months.

He was first diagnosed with gastritis and irritable bowel syndrome, due to the symptoms he was showing.

Andrew said: "The pains would always occur after I had eaten, no matter how small the meal.

"My pains became so severe I was bedridden for most of the week at university. I continued with my studies at Loughborough but this was starting to become increasingly hard."

His agony continued and he eventually decided he had to leave university.

He had emergency surgery to remove part of his bowel and returned to hospital on December 17 for a check up and to get the results of the test.

Andrew wasn't prepared for the shock news.

He said: "I went to this meeting thinking I was going to get the all clear.

"I walked into the appointment and the surgeon said that preliminary test results showed signs of further illness. This was when the words cancer and chemotherapy first arose.

"The treatment was expected to be chemotherapy, something that I did not know anything about, and was filled with dread thinking about."

Andrew's first visit for diagnosis tests and chemotherapy visits, brought home the difference in his chemotherapy treatment centre and certain other places in the region.

This was when he thought about raising money to attempt to narrow this gulf and CANtreat was born.

Andrew said: "The atmosphere of a ward can change a patient's attitude towards their cancer.

"This can be changed by updating the physical environment, which raises the morale of the staff, and provides a nicer working environment, which the staff can then project onto the patients, putting them at ease when they arrive for treatment."

Andrew completed his chemotherapy in April.

He added: "It's now a case of watching and waiting to see if the cancer returns.

"I know that no matter what, I have the support of everyone who stood by me before, which would get me through everything."

CANtreat is a registered charity which is funded by private and corporate donations, which can be made on-line at cantreat.co.uk.