Running in the dark for Choroideremia on 23 May

We're raising money to support scientific research into the rare eye condition Choroideremia.

Our 6 year old son Ollie has Choroideremia - it begins with night blindness in childhood and then progresses to tunnel vision and blindness 20 to 30 years later.

There is currently no treatment or cure for Choroideremia but some very clever scientists are working on it for us!

Clinical gene therapy trials began in the UK in 2011. The results are really encouraging but we need to keep the trials going. We've been donating money towards the research for a while but we thought now was a good time to raise awareness and some extra funds.

The money we raise will go to the Tommy Salisbury Choroideremia Fund via the UK charity Fight for Sight. The Fund was founded in 2005 by Emma Salisbury and her mother after Emma's son Tommy was diagnosed. It directly funds the vital research at Imperial College London.

If the clinical trials and research continue, we're confident that a treatment will be available before Ollie starts suffering the more severe symptoms of Choroideremia.

It goes without saying that it's a lot for a 6 year old to understand so all Ollie knows is that he has special eyes that don't work very well in the dark. Hopefully a treatment will be developed so he won't need to know the rest.

Any money you donate will go into an ANZ bank account we've set up before being transferred over to the UK charity Fight for Sight.

Details of the trail run can be found at http://www.xterrawellington.co.nz/ Give us a shout if you want to join us, it'll be my birthday after all! Given that running is not really my thing, running through the bush at night with a head- torch on will be quite an adventure!!

Thank you so much for your support, it means such a lot to us.

We're also fundraising in the UK - https://www.justgiving.com/Gemma-wiig