A mum of three with only months to live has started a fundraiser to help support her children after her death. Louise Bees was diagnosed a with bowel cancer two years ago and has been having chemotherapy but the cancer has spread.
The 48-year-old said that sometimes she feels like she is living in an alternate reality, continuing everyday with normal life and trying not to think about the short time she has left with her children, who she has been bringing up on her own.
“I’m going to fight to stay here because I have my kids,” said Louise, whose cancer has now spread to her liver and lungs. She added it was 'heart-breaking' that she won’t be able to watch her children grow up, her youngest being only seven.
READ MORE: 'Proud' carer on why he's stayed in the job for so long
Louise had been bleeding when she went to the toilet for some time and didn’t think anything of it. But by the time she went to see the doctor two years ago, she was told that the cancer had been left untreated for several years.
Louise, who had previously struggled in a violent and abusive relationship, said that life had simply become a matter of survival. It took her some years to get over the trauma she had experienced but just as she had reached that point, she discovered she had terminal cancer.
The single parent, who lives in a council house in Whitchurch, is having her final course of chemotherapy after getting a second opinion when she had been advised to stop the treatment in October. She hopes her fundraiser, which has a £2,000 and has already reached £1,450, can help her to leave some money for her children and help her sister, who is planning to look after them.
Before having her eldest son, William who is now 19, Louise thought she would never have children and had to undergo fertility treatment. Louise, who is close to her children, feels like they are being 'ripped away' from her and hopes the fundraiser will mean less of a “struggle” for them after they lose her.
She said: “I have an amazing teenager who's 19 and has just started his mechanics apprenticeship. I have a wonderful nine-year-old daughter, Faith who has some special needs and I have my little boy, Louie who’s seven and he has additional needs.
“As you can imagine the thought of leaving my kids is heartbreaking and I do break down occasionally. All the things mother and daughter do together, I feel so cheated.
“I don’t know how to explain the devastation I feel knowing my whole life I’ve wanted kids and I had them later in life (at 39 and 41) and now I’m being ripped away from them. I just want them to have to struggle less, so if you could please help even if it's a penny, just for my children.”
Louise said that she has no history of cancer in her family so when she started to see the blood she didn't think it was anything serious. You can find out more about the signs and symptoms of bowel cancer on the NHS website here.
She hopes that when she is gone her children will be able to stay at their home in Whitchurch. If you would like to donate the fundraiser she set up in support of her three children who will be left without a mother, you can find the gofundme link here.
READ NEXT:
