Georgina’s Story

“My mum was the strongest, bravest, most incredible woman I have ever met and as a family we could not be more proud of the woman she was and the fight she put up to beat this horrible disease. She put her heart and soul into everything she did, from gardening to raising her children and everything in between. No matter what the circumstances, she always put her children and family first without any hesitations and would consistently put her wants and needs aside to ensure we never had to go without.

She loved a good renovation and this is what first brought her cancer to light. What she thought was a pulled muscle in her side from renovations, quickly turned into our biggest nightmare. She went to doctor after about a week of a constant dull pain in her side which lead to an ultrasound of her liver where doctors discovered the unimaginable. The ultrasound technician cried during the scan saying “you’re too young” but wasn’t able to say more and a specialist doctor appointment that followed left us with more questions than answers, He showed us the scans pointing out that her liver was cloudy all over to the point where it had him questioning what it was After more testing, a very painful biopsy and a colonoscopy we finally got the diagnosis of Primary Stage 4 Bowel Cancer that had metastasised to the liver and an approximate timeframe of 18 months to 2 years left to live. (June 15th 2017, aged 46 years young)

On the 3rd of August 2017, my mum had her first Chemo session. It wasn’t until after about the third session, the oncologist admitted to us that he never expected her to survive her first chemo session as her liver was so far involved in the cancer that they expected it to be the end of her. She not only survived the first chemo, but 4 more after that and had an incredible response to it. On the 6th out of an estimated 8 to 10 sessions, mum went into anaphylactic shock from the chemo around an hour in of the 3 hour session. This put a stop to the IV chemo and she continued on an oral chemo to see how she tracked. On the 22nd December 2017 we were advised mum was in a partial remission which almost never happens with her stage of cancer as it has stopped progressing and the oral chemo was keeping it at bay. That didn’t last long.

Her amazing oncologist retired at the end of 2017 with him wishing her well and passing her case to his colleague. She went on to try a different kind of chemo but the cancer did not respond as much as they expected, although there was a minor improvement, the new oncologist told her it wasn’t enough to continue and she had exerted her options of treatment. I researched all possible options and alternatives and managed to convince him to try the original chemo at a lower dose over a longer time, mum only tolerated 2 sessions and the oncologist called it quits on that too.

Determined to outlive the doctors expectations, we tried a private second opinion and looked into two possible unfunded drugs that could have given her an extra 3 months at most, they both had giant price tags that without a life insurance pay out we would never have been able to consider. Once all the testing was completed and mum was ready to start on one, the cancer in her liver had progressed further and she was no longer a candidate for the unfunded drugs. Time was up and my brother and I got called home. We did all we could to make her comfortable in her last month and were lucky enough to be able to keep her at home until the end just as she wanted with the support of our local Hospice nurses.

Bowel Cancer is no joke and is a very silent killer. My mum is superwoman, fighting with everything she had and outlived the doctors expectations by 6 weeks passing away on the 29th July 2019. 2 years and 6 weeks post diagnosis, aged 48. My Hero.”