Training for Ben

I had the idea last week that I would climb Ben Nevis for charity. I will state my motives for this in an honest and open manner.

1. If I have to train for Ben Nevis my legs will surely become toned and attractive.

2. If I have to train for Ben Nevis I might lose weight.

3. Making plans is "positive" behaviour and I feel the need to prove myself as "positive" having whinged and complained all the way through surgery, chemotherapy etc.

4. Oldham Cancer Support Centre, who I want to raise funds for, were a lifeline to me during the dark days of chemotherapy and I want to give something back.

5. I want to do something in memory of my friends Paul Kelly and Diane Buckley, who both died of cancer this year and who were also helped by Oldham Cancer Support Centre.

6. I want to promote the need for emotional support for people with cancer, because in my experience (and I know I am not alone in this) there was zero support from people who should have been providing it, e.g. my Breast Care Nurse. I do not mean to suggest that I did not have support from friends and family, but it is very hard for them to try to comfort someone who is in a state of mortal terror.

7. I want to help remove the stigma associated with being anxious and depressed during cancer treatment. The continual pressure to Look On The Bright Side makes you feel you are going mad.

8. I have an inferiority complex caused by my ex, who had walked the Pennine Way 12 times, climbed God knows how many mountains, owned 17 pairs of walking boots, and would never go for a walk with me because he said I walked too slowly.

9. I will be accompanied by 3 of the funniest people I know i.e. Nicola, Andrea, and my sister; we are collectively to be known as Team Ben.

10. It will make me look like a right trooper.

Since deciding to take up this challenge (and it will be a challenge, because I have a bad knee and when I went up Snowdon the first time I nearly cried with the effort) I have been deluged with offers of advice and help from the many experienced mountaineers I seem to know. Penfold (Duke of Edinburgh award leader) and Ginger Beard (Munro-bagger) have offered to accompany "Team Ben" up the mountain. This is because they want to appear manly, take any opportunity to hold our hands to help us down steep bits, possibly share a dorm with us in Glen Nevis hostel, and tell us we are doing it all wrong. I have been wise to this trick since I went camping with Andrew King in Ashfield Valley when we were 16, and the next day he dressed up in camouflage gear and made me walk up hill and down dale so he could hold my hand when crossing streams. Penfold and Ginger Beard, no.

I have also been offered a training weekend in Snowdonia by a friend (climber and mountain rescuer) who shall remain nameless because he is shy. This is because he wants to appear manly but he will not want to hold our hands down the steep bits (well not my hand anyway) and it was he who told me that if you take a wrong compass bearing on the top of Ben Nevis you can fall off the edge. Fall off! Into the void! Survive cancer and then fall to my doom off the top of Ben? No thankyou. I will accept compass training with gratitude.

It is at this point that I would like to state I have climbed a few hills in my time. If you go to Pentir in North Wales (kind of between Bangor and Llanberis) there is a cottage halfway up the mountain, where I used to live. To get to this cottage you had to climb up a steep road and then 3 steep fields. Unfortunately in the 3rd field there was a huge Charolais bull, notoriously bad-tempered, and I was so scared of this bull that I used to walk right up to the top of the mountain and back down the other side to my cottage, thus Bewaring of the Bull. I did this every day, carrying my shopping. I thought nothing of it.

As I used to think when my ex (17 pairs of walking boots, "the 450 Viagra were a free sample, NewbieNudes was a pop-up") boasted interminably about his mountain walking exploits, it's just putting one foot in front of the other. Last time I went up Snowdon a woman with one leg was coming down at the same time as me. One leg and a crutch! That's a challenge.

We have 9 months to train for going up Ben. Nicola has been up before. I went up Snowdon twice in a week once. Three of us have had babies. I have had FEC chemotherapy. Andrea does spinning classes. We can put one foot in front of the other.

So please don't laugh at us and please don't tell us we're going to get altitude sickness. The time to laugh is when I do the compass bearing wrong, fall off the edge and die in which case you can rename this blog "Famous Last Words".