A Co Tyrone woman has opened up on her mum’s battle with a rare type of incurable blood cancer.
Claire Murphy's mum Jennifer, aged 53, was diagnosed with multi melanoma in March 2020 during the first Covid-19 lockdown.
Jennifer, from Cookstown , had to attend appointments on her own as hospitals shut down to visitors, while Claire and family had to hear the diagnosis over the phone.
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While Jennifer continues to battle the deadly disease, daughter Claire is taking on a six week fitness challenge at Aaron’s Gym in the town run by Cancer Focus to raise funds for its services.
“We hadn’t really experienced cancer in our family at all, and then lockdown hit and mum took ill,” Claire told MyTyrone.
“But because everything was closed and everyone was so scared she wasn't able to get up to the doctors.
“It got to the stage where she became desperately unwell and there was a nine hour wait for an ambulance, so I had to pile her into the back of the car.
“We since found out that another 24 hours and she might not have even survived to have treatment.
“We weren’t able to see her really, I just had to drop her off and leave. We got a phone call then from the consultant, who was probably as distressed as us as it was sort of a unique situation that he hadn’t been in before.
“He had us on speakerphone and basically told us that mum had incurable blood cancer.
“Mum stayed in hospital for about six weeks and had treatment, since then she has also been in for treatment and had a stem cell transplant.
“The type of cancer it is, she’ll always have it until it becomes too much for her. She’s been living with it since then.”
Claire added her mum found a local Cancer Focus group that allows her to keep up her hobby of artwork and wanted to raise the funds through the six week Fitness Factor challenge at the local gym.
She added: “Services seemed to shut down so it was quite difficult, but Cancer Focus had an art therapy group.
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“She’s not really well enough at the minute but if she can get herself well enough that’s the type of thing that she likes to do.
“It’s really more of a focus for now as we are living with it, it’s families that live with it as well and it affects a lot of people."
Claire herself has had her own health issues and sadly went through surgery for ectopic pregnancy recently, and is using the challenge to get back on her feet.
“I’ve been recovering from that, Covid unfortunately didn’t help that as well as my partner wasn’t able to stay with me or anything like that," she said.
“It wasn’t cancer for us but you just never know when life is going to change forever.
“I’ve been quite frustrated with my physical recovery, but the timing of this challenge is good for me so I can get back to doing something positive for mum and my own physical and mental health.”
Cancer Focus is looking for more volunteers to take part in the Fitness Factor challenge starting on 29 March, contact emmamccann@cancerfocusni.org for more information.
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