A best friend of a 'lovely' dad who tragically passed away just weeks after being diagnosed with three types of cancer has spoken of her heartbreak over his sudden death.
Jamie Thompson went to hospital in early November after experiencing stomach pains. Tests revealed he had stomach, lung and chest cancer., and in just two weeks, he suffered a bleed to the brain that left him unable to breathe properly. Family and friends gathered to say their goodbyes, and he tragically passed away on November 22.
Now best friend Amy Milburn has set up a fundraising page to give him a send-off "fit for a king" and help secure the future of five-year-old daughter Melody-Rose. She described Jamie as a 'lovely guy' who had a 'zest for life', reports TeessideLive.
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The Middlesborough dad went to the doctor after experiencing stomach pains that he thought were signs of an ulcer. Old neighbour Amy said the doctor wanted to run some tests on Thursday November 3 - by the Monday he was in so much 'agony' he got a colleague to drop him off at A&E.
"They ran some tests and his white blood cells were up so they said there was an inflammation somewhere," she said. "They took him for a CT scan and brought him out and immediately put him straight back in. He rang me and said can you come down they are telling me I have got cancer.
"Obviously he was really upset so I went to James Cook and we sat there and the nurse explained that he had a mass on his stomach and a tumor in each lung, and one in his chest."
Amy said you could see Jamie's "whole entire world came crashing down around him" in that moment, adding that his "heart literally broke." She said he was prescribed some tramadol, a strong painkiller, with the hospital telling him that they would be in touch about a biopsy.
Jamie was born in Stockton but was living in South Bank at the time of his passing. He leaves behind his five-year-old daughter Melody-Rose, who Amy said "was his absolute world" and that he "lived and breathed for her."
Amy, who previously lived next door to Jamie, said: "Jamie was lovely, a really lovely guy. He always put everybody before himself.
"He could've been feeling the worst he's ever felt but if you messaged him and said you were in a bad place then he would always be there for you. He always had a smile on his face, no matter what was going on in his life."
The 35-year-old added: "He just had such a zest for life. He was doing his best by his daughter. He was such a hard-working bloke and he worked to provide for his daughter when he had her on a weekend. If you were his friend, you were his friend for life. He was just such a lovely guy - nobody I've spoken to has had a bad word to say about him."
'Lovely' Jamie's final days
On Saturday, November 19, Amy went round to Jamie's house after not hearing from him all day despite numerous attempts to get in touch. She said: "He had been sick on his phone, so he wasn't able to contact anybody and he was just in agony and couldn't stop vomiting.
"We rang the ambulance and they turned up quite rapidly and started to give him some anti-sickness and then I travelled in the ambulance with him to A&E. He was sent for another scan and the mass on his stomach had grown significantly. He was still vomiting through anti-sickness."
Jamie was admitted to hospital, and got put in the ward not long after she left at 3am the following morning. Amy said then began experiencing numbness on his left-hand side on Sunday, but that his sickness appeared to be under control. He was taken for a biopsy on Tuesday.
She added: "He went down and came back onto the ward and spoke to the nurse and said he was quite pleased with himself because he was absolutely petrified of needles. The nurse remembers speaking to him as he came onto the ward and then he went into cardiac arrest just minutes after. They managed to get his heartbeat back but unfortunately, he wasn't breathing for himself.
"They had to put a breathing tube in. Then they rushed him down for another emergency CT scan of his brain to find out that he had a spontaneous subarachnoid haemorrhage, basically a massive bleed on the brain. His brain wasn't telling his lungs to breathe properly. They told us to ring family and friends to come and say their goodbyes because they were taking the tube out that evening."
Jamie sadly passed away at 8.56pm on November 22.
'I want to make sure his legacy lives on'
Now Amy is trying to raise money by setting up a GoFundMe for Jamie, which at the time of writing had raised £515. She said: "He put me down as his next of kin in the hospital and we had spoken about his funeral - not in great detail - but we spoke about it because it is always an outcome when cancer is mentioned. I'm trying my best to give him the send-off that he deserves."
On the fundraiser, she added: "This has been one of the hardest things for his friends and family to go through. I want to make sure his legacy lives on and [that] he can still provide for his little girl even after he has gone. Thank you for taking the time to read this and also donating. Rest in paradise, Jamie."
To donate to the GoFundMe, click here.
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