A family was left heartbroken when a mum who thought she had a virus that "wouldn't go away" discovered she had cancer.
Dianne Berry was diagnoses with gallbladder cancer when she was 60. It came at a time when "emotions were heightened" just a few weeks before Christmas 2021. Retired operations manager Dianne initially thought she had a stomach virus, before being later told it was gallstones.
But after Diane got an appointment with a consultant, she was told that there were "suspicious things" in her gallbladder.
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Her daughter Kayleigh Cross-Berry told the Liverpool ECHO : “We went through a lot of emotions because we were told not to worry and that it was just gallstones, but to then find out it was cancerous was devastating, especially just before Christmas. As it was a cancer we never hear about, the first thing I did was Google and to see the expectation of life with gallbladder cancer and that not many people survive after two years, we knew instantly this was going to end up as a tragedy for our family.
"My mum was the centre of our family. It ripped us apart, but also brought us closer in the short time we had battling it with her.”
Dianne was initially told she had two years to live so her family came together for Sunday lunches and trips away to make the most of the time she had left. Dianne’s “main aim” was to make it to her daughter’s wedding but she sadly died just three weeks before at the age of 61.
But Kayleigh made sure her mum was remembered by wrapping Dianne's picture around her bridal bouquet and placing another picture on the bar so “everyone could raise a toast” to her whenever they got their drinks.
Kayleigh said: “It was a lot to process, especially because she was so involved in my wedding and we were due to get married the year before, but because of Covid it was postponed. I started thinking if it wasn’t postponed she would have been there for it.
"The positive we had with it being postponed was she knew every detail. She’d seen me in the dress, she’d seen all the bridesmaids and the flowers - she had a fingerprint on every last detail.”
Kayleigh and her family are now hoping to raise money as well as awareness of gallbladder cancer. She added: “Raising the awareness is key because if one person hears a story from another family and goes and gets checked out and just gets that extra time with their family, then I think that's the aim of these events.”
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