For Renee and Glenn Atkinson, the birth of their two daughters was far from a walk in the park.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
They were told their twin girls Eleanor and Zoe would share a placenta and that they were high risk as a result.
"That was a bit unnerving," Mr Atkinson said.
They were referred to the Royal Hospital for Women at Randwick and were back and forth between there and Orange Hospital for much of the pregnancy, until the girls were born prematurely at 34 weeks.
The girls then spent another 16 days at the NICU in Sydney, before living at Orange Hospital for another 3.5 weeks.
"Without the specialists that we worked with, the equipment they had access to, they might not have made it," the loving dad said.
"We met one particular family who had a boy at 26 weeks and was in hospital for 205 days all up. It takes a toll on the family. The people in these hospitals are unbelievable. We cannot thank them enough."
But thank them he will try.
One night he came across the charity Running for Premature Babies. While Mr Atkinson might not be a marathon runner, he had the idea of walking from Orange to the hospital in Randwick, all while pushing his twin daughters' pram, to raise money for the charity.
With roughly 260km separating the two health services, he certainly has his work cut out for him.
"I don't want to get to the point where I turn up to start day one and I'm grossly underdone," he said.
"I've been doing a couple of 20km walks and it's a lot harder than you'd think. I'm going to try and walk a marathon a day. If I can do that it would take about seven or eight days and I'd be happy."
He has set himself a target of raising $65000 before the January walk and has already amassed more than $8000.
"I've been so overwhelmed and the one part that has made me nervous isn't walking the distance, because worst case scenario you just don't do as many kilometres in a day and it takes you three times as long, but you'll get there" he added.
"It's the fundraising target because I've never raised $65000 before."
But with the daily cost for a baby to stay in a NICU being as much as $10000, he knows every dollar counts.
To support him on this journey, you can search 'Push from the Bush' on Facebook or on the charity's website.
Our journalists work hard to provide local, up-to-date news to the community. This is how you can continue to access our trusted content:
- Bookmark www.centralwesterndaily.com.au
- Make sure you are signed up for our breaking and regular headlines newsletters
- Follow us on Twitter
- Follow us on Instagram
- Catch up on our news headlines at Google News