‘Cancer kids know things no child should’: Mum’s fight to raise awareness of childhood cancer
One brave Adelaide mum is candidly reliving every parent’s worst nightmare – the painful experience of having a child diagnosed with cancer, twice. Here’s what she wants families to know.
SA News
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“These kids have to grow up quicker than they should and know about things that no child should,” begins Emma Dunn on the 10th consecutive day of posting about her young son’s years-long battle with cancer.
“What child says, ‘I have to be careful not to hurt myself ‘cos I don't know what my platelet counts are’, or ‘Don't come too close in case you’re sick ‘cos I don't know what my neutrophil counts are’?”
The Adelaide Hills mum-of-two is sharing her family’s raw, real and painful experience of a childhood cancer diagnosis on social media each day this month in a bid to raise awareness of the disease she desperately hopes a cure is found for.
She admits the Liam’s Fight Facebook posts, written to coincide with September’s International Childhood Cancer Awareness Month, are taking a toll as she relives the suffering of her youngest child.
“As soon as October 1 turns over things turns pink for breast cancer which is great but childhood cancer doesn’t really get the publicity a lot of the other cancers do – it seems to be forgotten,” Mrs Dunn, of Littlehampton, said.
“I don’t know if it is because childhood cancer is just too hard and confronting for people to see … it is not little cute kids looking happy, it is horror and devastation.”
She doesn’t want people to feel sorry for Liam, now 11, but to gain greater understanding and insight into what the impact childhood cancer has on a family.
“People often forget the siblings,” Mrs Dunn, whose eldest son, Noah, is 13, posted on Day 5.
“They are carted to and from the hospital, they miss out on spending time with either one or both of their parents and they miss out on doing things as a family ... playing with (their sibling).
“These kids need to be kids.”
The Dunn family’s nightmare began in 2015 when Liam was six, diagnosed after a cold that wouldn’t lift worsened.
“Never in your wildest dream would you ever expect it to be cancer … he was just a normal little boy,” Mrs Dunn said, referring to the diagnosis Liam had a rare sub type of acute lymphoblastic leukaemia (ALL).
“It just felt like the bottom of the world had fallen out ... I can’t even explain it, it was just the worst feeling ever.”
Little Liam went through two years of treatment only to have the cancer return seven months on.
“This was even worse than the first time because we knew what we were going to have to go through and we knew how sick he was going to be,” Mrs Dunn said.
“I will never forget Liam looking at me and saying, ‘some people don’t even get cancer once and I got it twice’ … it just broke my heart.”
This time, Liam required a bone-marrow transplant – made possible through a UK-based cord blood donor – and the family relocated to Sydney for four months.
Liam endured many complications throughout his treatment, including his little body going into septic shock at one stage as well as two perforated bowels, requiring him to use a ileostomy bag for 10 months.
For now Liam is well, back at school, involved again in sport and playing with his big brother, but his family remain on tenterhooks, forever fearful of another relapse.
“It is absolutely scary – every cold, sniffle, headache, rash, bruise, you automatically think, ‘is it back?’,” Mrs Dunn said.
“I just don’t know how we would cope, how we would get through it … but other families have — some four or five times.”
