I'm Jojogingerhead, a 31 year old artist & musician based in Brighton (UK) satirically documenting the highs and lows of my secondary triple negative breast cancer diagnosis. Trying to see the light in a dark and scary situation without using the words fight, battle, journey or survivor.
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Raising a glass to Claire
It has been a difficult few days after finding out that one of the girls I met through the Younger Breast Cancer Network lost her life on Thursday morning. Claire had just celebrated her 30th birthday, she was unwell over Christmas and New Year and taken into hospital where she had a number of tests. They couldn’t work out what was wrong with her and she was sent home as her symptoms improved but sadly she fell ill again and was taken back into hospital where they soon discovered her cancer had spread to her spinal fluid and brain and she was given a prognosis of weeks.
She wrote this final blog after learning of her diagnosis.
Even though we had never met in real life, we often chatted online and I was in admiration of her strength, humour and courage. Claire had the same type of cancer as myself and was so helpful to me when I was diagnosed with Triple Negative secondary breast cancer (after going through treatment for primary breast cancer last year). She sent me messages of support and gave me advice on having Triple negative and the same chemotherapy that we were both having. One of her last messages to me was this, it gave me so much comfort at the time:
“I just wanted to say that you are one strong, amazing lady. I have thought about you everyday and if positivity can be sent by the power of the mind then you’ve got bucketloads coming from me. Yeah you’ve been special getting two types of cancer at the same time, but I’ve got complete faith that you can be just as special and get rid of it too.”
She was raising money for Macmillan and hoping to raise £2000, after finding out about her diagnosis her JustGiving page went up to nearly £4000 in a matter of days.
There is nothing more I can say that sums it up better than the blog posts of my fellow breast cancer friends Sarah, Rebecca and Rosie.
I am sending my thoughts to her family, partner and friends and I hope they can see how much she was loved and admired by the online community.
Sleep well Claire, I know we never met in real life but I hope one day our souls will meet again x
Raising a glass to Claire.
x