The KPMG Lentemarathon will host many people with unique stories, including Sevgi Fruytier. Together with 9 colleagues from ReumaNederland, she runs the KPMG Lentemarathon to raise money for the charity they work for every day.
Sevgi is program coordinator at ReumaNederland’s ”Research and Impact” department. ReumaNederland is committed to improving the quality of life with rheumatism. They do this through research into better treatments, providing reliable information and looking after the interests of people with rheumatism.
Sevgi herself practiced athletics for several years, with hurdles as her specialty. Nowadays, she still enjoys going running or doing other athletic activities such as bootcamps and yoga. When she saw that the KPMG Lentemarathon was offering a marathon relay, she called her colleagues together to participate, to raise money for ReumaNederland. Her colleagues immediately responded enthusiastically to the idea; together with her colleagues, Sevgi signed up no less than two relay teams and two 5K runners. A group text has already been created to encourage each other and train together.
National collection week Reumafonds
However, Sevgi and her colleagues are training for something even greater than their own sporting achievement. They are running to draw attention to ReumaNederland’s national collection week (March 19 to 25), which begins on the day of the KPMG Lentemarathon, and also to kick off their collection week with a head start through a sponsored run.
“People with rheumatism live with pain, stiffness and fatigue every day. In most forms of rheumatism, the symptoms are treatable. But rheumatism itself cannot yet be cured. Often rheumatism is invisible. It cannot be seen on the outside.” said Sevgi. “Everyone knows someone with rheumatism. Currently there are more than 2 million people in the Netherlands who have some form of rheumatism. Every day we take on the challenge of lifting the limitations of rheumatism and ensuring that people with rheumatism can move without pain and fatigue. We do all this from our own expertise, from research funding, to advocacy, to finance. We want to get moving not only in the workplace, but beyond. Together with our friends and family, we are physically challenging ourselves with a joint team performance and fundraiser to do our part to contribute to our causes in this way as well.”
The choice for the KPMG Lentemarathon had a second reason: “We want to show how much impact rheumatism has but also what you can do to reduce the pain and even prevent getting it. Exercise is a very important tool in this. By moving your joints every day, you improve the mobility of your joints and reduce the stiffness of your muscles and joints. In addition, exercise can also reduce fatigue.” That’s an added incentive for ReumaNederland participants to participate in the KPMG Lentemarathon.
ReumaNederland has just entered a new strategic period with the main focus on making rheumatism a reversible, non-chronic condition so that everyone can move freely without pain. They want to do this, among other things, by focusing on precision medicine and by making ReumaNederland the platform for transparent communication and social awareness, so that everyone is aware of rheumatism and the impact it has on people.
Donate to ReumaNederland
You can still help support Sevgi and her colleagues at ReumaNederland. Donate to the colleagues for ReumaNederland can be done through this link!
