Every fortnight for the next 10 years, Noel Bresland will pull on his trainers and force his tired legs to pound the streets for 26.2 miles.

For Noel is determined to complete 223 marathons in memory of his nephew Ethan who lived for just 223 days.

Noel's challenge will take him right around the world – his next race will be on the Isle Of Man on August 8 - as he aims to run a marathon on every continent including one in the South Pole to raise cash and awareness for the premature baby charity Bliss.

Noel, 34, explained: It is daunting and everyone thinks I am mad, but for me it is part of the healing process after Ethan's death. Seeing his little coffin no more than a foot long was heartbreaking, and I wouldn't wish that experience on anyone. If by doing this challenge I raise awareness and money for Bliss, and make something positive out of my family's tragedy, then it will be a real achievement. More than anything I want people to remember Ethan.

In January 2007 Noel's sister Marie Perry gave birth to twins 15 weeks prematurely, Erin weighed just 1lb 8oz and Ethan 1lb 10oz.

Ethan contracted MRSA when he was just three weeks old, and survived heart, stomach and eye surgery before he and sister Erin were finally well enough to come home aged five months.

Marie, 31, said: I will never forget that day. I pushed the twins in their pram to pick the other children up from school and when we came home I cooked the first proper meal I had cooked in months.

Then the children all sat down and watched The Simpsons with the twins snuggled up next to them. We felt like a proper family.

But just a few weeks later, Ethan contracted a chest infection which turned into pneumonia and he had to be readmitted to hospital.

His condition was complicated by the fact that his body had never managed to fight off the MRSA bug he had contracted shortly after he was born, and the bug had developed in the mucus in his lungs.

He struggled for two weeks before doctors gave Marie and husband Chris a stark choice.

Fighting back tears, Marie explained: They ran some tests and told us that Ethan had just five days left to live. His only chance was a course of steroids, but they told us these steroids could kill Ethan. We had no choice but to let them give him the steroids.

Ethan was on a ventilator and maximum oxygen but he was still struggling. It was obvious the steroids weren't working. We just decided enough was enough.

I remember being sat in a chair and being handed my beautiful baby the way it should have been when he was born, without wires and tubes. Then Ethan smiled at me and his daddy and died in my arms.

The whole family was devastated by Ethan's death, and Noel was determined to keep his memory alive.

He said: His death hit everybody really hard. I had never even held Ethan when I had been to visit him he was still in his incubator. Everyone has their own way of dealing with their own grief, and I decided to run.

I had always run and had done marathons before, including one to the North Pole, but I had been out injured and hadn't run for 18 months. But I came up with the challenge of running 223 marathons to raise 22,300 in memory of Ethan.

My first marathon was London in 2009 and I just set off and did it with no training. Once I knew I could still run a marathon, my mind was made up.

Noel, from Manchester, is raising money for Bliss, the premature baby charity which helped Marie while the twins were in hospital.

Marie said: The support I got from Bliss was amazing. When the doctors came to tell me that Ethan needed heart surgery, everything they said just went right over my head.

But then a lady from the Bliss support group came and explained it to me in simple language.

They helped us in so many ways. We have three older children and the Bliss group gave them colouring books to keep them entertained while we spent time with the twins in hospital. Knowing our other children were happy and content meant we could concentrate on Erin and Ethan.

When I think about how much money the care of our twins cost it is unbelievable. We are so grateful for the care they received.

Even after everything that has happened, I still count myself as lucky. I know we only had Ethan for seven-and-a-half months, but we might only have had him for seven minutes.

Every time I look at Erin I see Ethan. I know that everything she does, every little bit of mischief she gets into, she does it for both of them.

I think Noel is crazy for choosing this challenge, but I know he will do it. When he first came up with the idea of running 223 marathons, I told him just to do 223 miles. But he said he wanted to do a marathon for every day of Ethan's life, because everyday of his little life was a marathon.

If by Noel doing this challenge we can raise awareness and money for Bliss, then I feel we will have given a little bit back as a family. We are just so thankful to have had Ethan, even for a short time.

I hope what happened to Ethan will make people more aware of MRSA and how essential it is for people to wash their hands to prevent this bug from spreading.

Noel has completed 19 marathons so far and has got one booked in every fortnight this year.

And he even has plans to run a marathon on a treadmill inside a pod on the London Eye.

Marie, her husband Chris, and children Ryan, 10, Meghan, 8, Madison, 5, and three-year-old Erin try to go and support him on his marathon challenge.

He did one that finished at Stonehenge and the children jumped on the course and ran across the finish line with him. He has made me promise to run one marathon with him it will have to be number 223 so I have got 10 years to train!