Gold Coast cancer survivor tackles real ‘killer’ of young patients this Bandanna Day

Bandanna Day is October 28 this year, and Gold Coast cancer survivor Elliott Cox is an ambassador on a mission to give back.

ELLIOTT Cox faced “12 out of 10” pain through his years of cancer treatment, but says the real “killer” is loneliness – a pain he never wants another young person facing cancer to feel.

As an ambassador for CanTeen’s National Bandanna Day (October 28), the Runaway Bay man wants to return his experience to the community that gave him so much.

“I felt like I learned a lot (through treatment),” Mr Cox said. “I want to be able to share that knowledge with another young person who also feels alone, and doesn’t know who to turn to.”

“Everyone’s cancer treatment is completely different, but we can find common ground. They can say, ‘well, Elliott got through it, Elliott’s been able to do it’.”

In October 2015, when Mr Cox was just 18, doctors at the Gold Coast University Hospital found a soccer ball-sized tumour in his chest, kidneys, and pressing on an artery in his neck, threatening to trigger a brain aneurysm.

The cancerour tumour in Elliott’s chest was the biggest Gold Coast doctors had ever seen. Picture: Supplied.

His life as a fit, 18 year old semi-professional soccer player came to a halt Picture: Supplied.

He was a semi-professional goalie for the Logan Lightning Football Club, studying law and international business; but hodgkin’s lymphoma, a blood cancer, brought it to a screeching halt.

“You go from (having) a life ahead of you to being put in this chronic disease category,” Mr Cox said.

“And being in a ward where people would walk past my room and go what’s a young person like you doing here?”

“You did feel ostracised, you did feel alone. There were no other young people there.”

He was, literally, too big or the “haunting” children’s ward, but the youngest, sickest patient in the oncology ward.

Mr Cox faced brutal chemotherapy, radiation, and surgery. Picture: Supplied.

For years he watched his friends travel, study, go to festivals, and livee like he wanted to, while dealing with shingles, meningitis, fungal infections, and copping brutal chemotherapy.

“You’re sitting at home by yourself and looking at social media. You’re thinking why don’t I get invited. Why do messages stop after 2 weeks?”

In 2017, doctors had “good and bad” news for the then 20 year old: he was in remission, but the treatment had turned his lungs to irreparably scarred “cardboard”.

“I couldn’t breathe, I couldn’t walk without nearly passing out,” he recalls. “But, mentally, it hit even harder.”

“I can’t do the things I want to do anymore, was looking at social media looking at my friends thinking I want to go with them but I can’t.”

Mr Cox’s weight dropped from a “lean”, 6’1 socer player to little more than 50kg. Picture: Supplied

Looking at him now, it’s hard to believe cancer almost killed him. Picture: Jerad Williams

In June 2020, age 21, Mr Cox’s lungs collapsed and intensive care specialists at Gold Coast University Hospital put him on a “last chance” extracorporeal membrane oxygenation machine (ECMO) to cycle blood through an artificial lung.

In July 2020, donor lungs became available for a double transplant.

Two days before his 22nd birthday, Mr Cox woke from his coma.

Now he’s 25 and an Bandanna Day ambassador for CanTeen, a charity he wishes he knew about sooner to help deal with his loneliness.

“I did feel so alone. I didn’t know anyone else my age going through it,” he said. “I could’ve asked questions to thinks that were keeping me up at night.”

“CanTeen provide a service and a world where a young person doesn’t go through cancer alone. There will always be someone by your side.”

Noiw 25, Mr Cox is committed to raising awareness of CanTeen, the charity that helped save him from cancer’s real “killer” loneliness. Picture: Jerad Williams

The charity’s network of social workers, councillors, and social forums offer a “friendly ear” to the more than 23,000 Australians aged between 12 and 25 facing cancer.

It offers a handbook of sorts for an experience that has none, Mr Cox says.

“CanTeen doesn’t make you better, but it can provide that guidance, that support system you didn’t know you needed until you do,” he said, including support for friends and family.

“It can give you the tools to get through that stage and recapture the life cancer once tried to take away from you.”

National Bandanna Day is Canteen’s flagship fundraiser – the “World Cup final” Mr Cox likens it – raising more than $35 million over the years.

This year, the day coincides with Giving Day on October 28. The double-header has drawn a commitment from event partners to match all donations made from 7am (AEST) on Friday to reach CanTeen’s $270,000 target.

For more information, make a donation, or buy a bandana, go to www.bandannaday.org.au.