Our son William received his cancer diagnosed in early 2014 when he was just 18 months old – it was a high grade brain tumour, the long term survival statistics for which are very poor.
After surgeons first removed the tumour, which was the size of a golf ball…
…he underwent 9 months of chemo…
…and for a few months we thought he had beaten it…
…until in late 2015 it came back and our lives got turned upside down again. This time the surgery wasn’t so successful and not only was some of the tumour left on his brain stem, he was left with a tracheostomy and had to be tube fed again.
He then underwent six weeks of radiotherapy although his tumour had grown back significantly before it could be started…
In 2016, after we were told the radiotherapy hadn’t worked, he was given a brief course of chemotherapy before doctors told us there was nothing more they could do for him and he’d have only a few months left to live – he’d not likely see Christmas.
At this point we decided to look beyond conventional treatment and decided to start giving him Cannabidiol and put him on a Ketogenic Diet – within a few months William’s tumour shrank by two thirds and a few months later he was able to have his trachy removed
Two years later William continues to do well – our doctors were so astounded that they agreed to write a research proposal into Cannabidiol, which we helped fund and which was started early this year.
Although this is a positive first step, much more research needs to be done and the Children’s Brain Tumour Research Centre in Nottingham have agreed to put all money we raise towards researching the approaches we used.
You can help other kids benefit from what William has been through – my current employer, Colas, has very generously agreed to assist in our fundraising efforts and this weekend I’ll be taking part in a company Three Peaks Challenge – please consider sponsoring me by clicking here
#MakeWilliamWell #Ependymoma #Cannabidiol #KetogenicDiet #CBTRC
makewilliamwell.com 