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The pain radiated up to my shoulder and all in my side and I couldn’t breathe either. So my mum rang up the emergency doctor and described my symptoms. That evening I went for a CT scan, and we were worried because we thought a CT scan meant something major. They found a malignant tumour in my kidney and growths in my lung as well.
I can remember when the doctor actually sat down next to my bed and told me that I had a tumour. The first thing I said was, 'Remove it, get it out', and he said, ‘I’m afraid it’s not as simple as that.’ And I said, 'Am I going to get better? Is there a cure?', and all he could say was, 'We hope so.' He couldn’t tell me yes or no, he just said ‘we’ll do the best we can.’
Every Thursday morning I would go in and have chemotherapy. The chemotherapy that I took was in a liquid and came in a bag, and through a machine it was dripped straight into my heart and pumped to my entire body. The first few days I would have aching muscles, and you get lots of ulcers and your mouth becomes very, very sore and also chemotherapy causes lots of sickness. After having maybe three doses of chemotherapy, I lost my hair. I had two wigs - one was bought for me by my doctor, which was very nice of him!
One of the most important things to me when I was on chemo was to make it to the school prom. We had a prom in year 11 after our GCSEs and everybody was going. I had had chemo exactly a week before this big night and I had to try so hard to get some food inside me so I could leave the hospital. In the end I managed to make it, only because I had loads of anti-sickness drugs and tons of these fatty milkshakes.
I had an absolutely wicked time! We went in a really nice car, and I had a lovely dress and I wore my trendy wig. I had a great time and felt I was just part of the crowd again, part of everyone else and that I wasn’t left out of all the fun.
I finished treatment three years ago and at first I went on a three-weekly follow up and now I’m on a six-weekly follow up and then as the months and years go by that will become less and less. I don’t think about it in between each appointment.
I want to go and see the world a bit so I’m going to New Zealand to spend eight months working as an assistant teacher with a gap year organisation. Maybe get up to a bit of skydiving, white water rafting, things like that. I really want to meet loads of people and have a good social life and then, who knows?
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