Gracie was diagnosed with a rare childhood cancer called Rhabdomyosarcoma in January 2014. Itwas a few weeks before her third birthday. It was a total shock, we had been refered to an ENT consultant because she had a lump on the side of her nose that appeared at the beginning of Dec which wasnt getting any smaller and nobody seemed to be able to tell us what it was. 

I will never forget that day we were told it was cancer, I dont think telling parents their daughter had cancer was a typical day for the consultant we were seeing. (I suspect he was used to telling parents their kids needed their tonsils out) Anyway, we were refered to see Dr Makin in the oncogy dept the following week at Royal Manchester Childrens hospital, then we were sent home. 

Panic set in, we had no idea what we were facing. The first thing that goes through your mind is the horrible thought that your child is going to die. We had to tell our parents, that was awful. Then the few days wait until our appointment, tryingnot to google "types of childhood cancer", to be honest, we were both in such a state after we were told the news that neither of us could remember the name the consultant used to describe what she had. 

The day finally came when we met our oncology doctor, Guy Makin, (who became Dr Guy, named by Gracie). He seemed to know his stuff, got us straight into the ward and ordered lots of tests. We were told exactly what was going to happen, but it was awful waiting for the full news on what we were dealing with. It took a few days, but finally we were told that there were some positives, and that Gracie has a good chance of recovering after the treatment.

So, we started, as they say, on our journey. Chemo, radio, surgery, more chemo, more radio, more surgery. In total, Gracie had three rounds of full chemo and two rounds of maintenance chemo, five lots of radiotherapy, including Proton beam in Jacksonville Florida. about ten surgeries, across the three years, from tumor removal, to central lines, lymph nodes taken out. I've lost count to be honest. This then doesn't include all the other, what we would call minor things she had to put up with. Blood transfusions, cannulas, injections, thumb pricks for blood every week, dressing changes, swabs, scans, GA, ..... all things a child shouldn't have to out up with as normal part of life, and in anyone else's world, wouldn't be seen as normal or minor.

There is a charity called Beads of courage, which gives the children beads for every little or major thing they have done. the beads are all different colours and they even mark special occasions, such as hair growing back, end of treatment, remission etc. Its a little distraction for the children and helps them accept what they have to have done. We ended up with hundreds of these and we still probably missed out a quite a few along the way. Gracie did like to show these off!

Hospital wasn't always bad by any means. They have lovely play workers on the ward whos job it is to keep the children distacted and entertained. They even have a little hospital school, and the creative table was always a highlight and kept very well stocked. This really helped get us through the long days on the ward. It was never easy, being hooked up to a big Chemo machine, sometimes for days at a time, but you find a way round this. I do remember several occasions runnig after Gracie down the corridor of the ward pushing the Chemo machine along, whilst she was racing another kid on a ride on car. Its amazing what we managed to do really when we look back. Gracie wasnt prepared to let anything stop her having fun if she felt well enough!

Over the three and a half years we were in and out of the ward, we got to know the doctors and nurses very well. Dr Guy was fantastic, and we realy felt he made friends with Gracie, and was very amused with what she managed to get up to. the nurses were fantastic. They too felt like friends, we got to know what they were doing and they were always very interested in what Gracie was up to. They thought she was hilarious, particularly when she was dancing round the ward or giving the low down on the events from Strictly come dancing from the previous week. 

We will never forget everyone we met at the hospital, who helped us through the bad times and who shard the good times with us. Its an amazing place, and we are very lucky to have this support and  facility nearby and all for free thanks to our amazing NHS.

XOX