I Just want to give back

Maya hates running but did it for charity

- CALLY BROOKS

A teenager who helped raise more than £20,000 for charity while being treated for a brain tumour is "over the moon" to have been nominated for a Pride of Britain award.

Maya Tohid was aged 12 last June when she was diagnosed with a rare craniopharyngioma, which typically grows near the base of the brain and mainly affects young people.

Although it is benign, Maya, now 13, was so ill that her parents feared they might lose her.

But as soon as the courageous youngster began to perk up she started fundraising for the charity that had helped her and her family during the worst of their ordeal.

Mum Mahta, 43, says: "Maya told us, 'I just want to give back." The family's nightmare began when Maya starting having severe headaches every day.

Mahta and husband Reza, 47, took her to A&E. In fact, they took her three times, begging doctors to do more tests. Engineer Mahta says: "The headaches were so severe she was waking up in the middle of the night. We had no idea what to do."

Bouts of vomiting soon followed and Mahta's doctor friend told the family to get her looked at again.

Returning to hospital for a fourth time five weeks after the symptoms started Maya had an MRI. All the family, including her sister Isla, eight, went to hospital for the results.