Darcy's Story

When we found out that our beautiful daughter had cancer, shortly before her 3rd birthday, our world quickly shrunk to very little beyond our home and the hospital. Our lives became a whirlwind of tests, scans, chemotherapy and surgery, as all of the aspects of everyday family life that we’d taken for granted until the terrifying day we received the diagnosis suddenly disappeared. Our priority immediately became caring for Darcy, everything else became secondary to this. We were so lucky that the cancer was caught early and treatment was successful but we needed to start rebuilding our life as a family again after the inevitable periods where the family was split by the time spent in hospital for treatment.

We were offered the chance of a break at a caravan owned by a local cancer charity, which allowed us to have a few days away together as a family. The whole summer had been spent in and out of hospital, meaning that the children had both missed out on all the holidays and other fun that their friends were having, so this was a wonderful opportunity for them to get something back. It is almost impossible to put into words how special this time was for us all and how grateful we were to have it. After months of feeling trapped in our house or separated, due to time spent in hospital wards, just to be able to spend time together as a family was an amazing feeling. Darcy had a Hickman line fitted during treatment through which she had her chemotherapy drugs, which meant that she could not go swimming, something she really loved to do before her illness.

One of our happiest memories of the holiday was seeing the look of pure joy on her face being back in a pool, splashing around with her brother. We were very aware of the huge impact of his sisters illness on our son too and how important it was for them both to have time together to play and have fun, which they really got to do when we were away. Time away together gave us a chance to be a normal family again, something we were so grateful for. We have some truly wonderful memories of this time, which we will all cherish for the rest of our lives.