'We were in the same boat – trying to pick up our lives and make up for lost time'
My cancer came from nowhere – within a few weeks of noticing an ache in my leg, doctors had x-rayed the area and I was warned that it may be a bone tumour. There was no history of it in my family, I had been a healthy child, so it came completely out of the blue.
A month later, on my 17th birthday, I was told the cancer was in my left leg and my lungs. While all my friends were going out to clubs and getting boyfriends, I was stuck in a hospital bed in London undergoing eight rounds of chemotherapy and extensive surgery.
I can remember my mother in tears, and my father shocked into silence. But I didn't get upset, I just wanted to get on with the treatment. Within a few months of chemotherapy, the doctors told me that, thankfully, they had caught my cancer in time – for now I was in remission. My hair grew back and I felt more confident.
Before I went into hospital, I was one of those quiet girls who blend into a crowd. Being ill changed that. I became more outspoken about my illness and how it felt to be a teenager coping with a potentially terminal diagnosis. So much so, I agreed to be a mentor at a Teenage Cancer Trust concert, talking to patients and helping them to make friends. It was there I met Neil. He was 23, four years older than me, and had been going through treatment for cancer in his head and neck. He seemed so confident, I thought he was one of the cancer nurses. He later admitted he thought I worked for the charity. But actually we were in the same boat – trying to pick up our lives and make up for lost time. There was an instant attraction.
We exchanged phone numbers and began texting every day, even though I lived in Kent and he was in Chesterfield. Six months later, we were serious about each other, tentatively starting to plan for the future. Then we got the news Neil had always dreaded – his cancer had come back. "If you don't want to go on with the relationship, I'll understand," he said. Within a few hours, I'd packed the car and was on the motorway heading north. I stayed for six months.
