Sean serves up '˜ace' fundraiser with 8 hour tennis marathon

Sean had his own personal connection with the charity, his son James was born premature in August 2011,

James

was born a healthy baby boy in the Causeway Hospital in Coleraine but after a couple of hours James delovoped

breathing problems and was rushed to the neo natal unit in Antrim.

James spent 13 days in hospital before being released and is now a normal active caring four-year-old boy. Sean told the Ballymoney and Moyle Times: “With the amount of help TinyLife gave to us during the first few weeks of James’s life, I felt I had to give something back, so a few years back I decided to do a tennis

marathon to raise vital funds for TinyLife.

“Unfortunatly due to a couple of knee operations I had to put this on hold.

“But I’m fully recovered now and there was no better time to do it.”

Being a former Ulster and Ireland tennis player, Sean decided to play eight hours of tennis against eight different opponents.

“The event was a massive success and the support myself and the other players got was overwhelming.

“I thought if we raised, say £200, it would have been a success but to raise the amount that was raised says a lot about the kindness of the people of Ballycastle.

“To say it was tough would be an understatement but we kept on going to the end.

“The arm was sore for a couple of days but apart from that everything was good.”

Sean would like to thank everyone for there kind words of support and their donations which made it all worth while.

Sean says maybe next year he might raise the bar and do 10 hours!

Gillian Breen, TinyLife Community Fundraiser said: “Every day there are 7 babies born prematurely in Northern

Ireland.

“Some of the babies we support are born as early as 24 weeks and weigh as little as 1lb.

“TinyLife, formerly known as NIMBA, provides practical and emotional support to the parents of premature and sick babies through our family support programmes.

“All proceeds raised from this fantastic challenge will go towards helping families who have experienced having a premature baby around the province and we want to pass on our huge thanks to Sean and all this supporters for raising such a fabulous total”.

For more information about TinyLife and their services visit www.tinylife.org.uk or to get involved in fundraising please contact [email protected] or call 02890 815050.

TinyLife, formerly NIMBA, is Northern Ireland’s only premature and sick baby charity based in Carryduff.   

The charity funds research and provides a wide range of support services for families of premature and sick babies, including a breast pump loan service, hospital based support, home based volunteer support, baby massage, tiny gym, parents support group and baby sensory room service.   

There are seven babies born prematurely every single day in Northern Ireland.

Premature babies can be born as early as 24 weeks and survive. 

Currently, the smallest surviving baby born in Ireland was just 398g.   

Last year, TinyLife delivered over 10,000 hours of family support to families across the province.

TinyLife work with every neonatal unit in Northern Ireland, including Royal Victoria Hospital, Ulster

Hospital Dundonald, Craigavon Area Hospital, Daisyhill Hospital Newry, Antrim Area Hospital,

Altnagelvin Hospital and South West Acute Hospital, Enniskillen.

* Sean Moloney is pictured presenting a cheque for £2200.79 to Gillian Breen, TinyLife Community Fundraiser.

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