Abbey Barrett: Mum Justine shares 10-year-old daughter’s brain tumour battle
“We just keep getting hit”: A Tasmanian family are praying for a miracle after a tennis ball-sized tumour was discovered in their 10-year-old daughter’s brain. What their road ahead looks like.
Tasmania
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It was day one of the Barrett family’s “trip of a lifetime,” a catamaran adventure around Queensland’s Whitsundays, when they learnt that 10-year-old Abbey had what turned out to be an inoperable, tennis ball-sized brain tumour.
“We got off the plane at Airlie Beach to a missed phone call. We were in the ER next day with a brain tumour diagnosis. We didn’t even see the yacht,” mum Justine, a CSIRO researcher, told the Mercury.
“It was like our trip of a lifetime turned into our worst nightmare.”
Ms Barrett, who lives at Kettering alongside the rest of her family – which includes husband Rick and Abbey’s older sisters Tasmin and Willow – said she would never forget receiving the awful diagnosis at Mackay Base Hospital.
“All they said was that it was a brain tumour. They couldn’t give us any other information, they just looked at us with a deep sympathy that made us feel like we had no hope,” she said.
Since the diagnosis on June 20, Abbey’s outlook has worsened significantly.
“The prognosis is not good. Abbey’s brain tumour is nasty and aggressive. It’s the size of a tennis ball and can’t be operated on,” Ms Barrett said.
Having had an unsuccessful course of chemotherapy in Hobart, the family is now headed to Melbourne on Tuesday to bring out the “big guns” – a change of chemo regimen and six weeks of radiation therapy.
“We just keep getting hit, each week is something new. Most kids don’t lose hair and get sick [from chemo] – Abbey got sick and has lost two-thirds of her hair,” Ms Barrett said.
“We’ve had an unlucky run. That saying, ‘rolling with the punches,’ has never been more real. We keep getting punched and we’ve got to keep moving.”
The family’s desperate situation has led them to cast a wide net in search of pinpricks of hope.
“We’ve gotten passports for the kids, if we have to go overseas for whatever reason, we can,” Ms Barrett said.
“We’re looking into alternate therapies to support Abbey. There’s a lot of information out there but it’s pretty conflicting. We are fumbling through as best we can.”
Fortunately, Abbey’s battle is not one being waged by the Barrett family alone.
“The things that bring us joy is the support we’re getting,” Ms Barrett said.
Woodbridge Soccer Club, for which Abbey and Willow used to turn out, donated all canteen proceeds from a recent game day, while Woodbridge Primary School – “the girls don’t even go to that school anymore,” Ms Barrett said – held a dress-up fundraiser day.
The principal and another teacher at Nicholls Rivulet’s Peregrine School – the girls’ current school – have been helping out by running Tasmin and Willow home from school, with the pair frequently loaded up with “big bags of blueberries” from a green thumb in the school community.
An online fundraiser started by Ms Barrett’s boss at CSIRO, Denise Hardesty, has raised nearly $35,000 for the family at the time of writing.
“Justine and Rick are wholly focused on helping Abbey, as well as Willow and Tasmin, through this journey,” Ms Hardesty said.
“We are all here to help smooth the road ahead.”
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