Bethan's Story

This is Bethan Mia Ayliff. She was born on the 5th October 2001.
Bethan was diagnosed with Acute Lymphoblastic Leukaemia on the 15th February 2006 at just the age of 4.

Bethan had not been well for several weeks before the diagnosis, she had several infections and was getting very tired which was not usually like the outgoing girl she is.

I had my suspicions that she may have leukaemia from her symptoms but tried to put it to the back of my mind as you never think it will happen to one of your kids.
 

After several visits to the doctors I told them my fears and luckily one of the doctors agreed to send her for blood tests which made me feel a bit happier as I thought when the bloods come back clear I could stop worrying.

On the day of her blood tests I had a phone call from Bethan’s GP asking me to take Bethan to The hospital as her bloods were abnormal and she needed checking out.

Really after that call I knew, I remember ringing my mum and saying to her I know she has cancer and later on that afternoon it was confirmed she had leukaemia although it was 2 days later it was confirmed as Acute Lymphoblastic Leukaemia (ALL).

It was all very bizarre that one minute she had been a normal happy child and the next minute she was in hospital having needles stuck hear there and everywhere I will never forget how much she screamed and there was nothing we could do to help her.
 

We just felt numb couldn’t believe it couldn’t eat or sleep I don’t know how we got through those first few days.

Luckily Bethan was able to stay at Northampton General Hospital for her treatment as some children have to be transferred to Birmingham Children’s Hospital which would have been a lot harder for us as we also have a son Jamie who was 5 at the time.

Over the first 5 weeks Bethan responded well to her treatment and achieved remission at the end of the 5th week as hoped but the MRD result came back that she was at a high risk of relapse which was terrible news that we didn’t want to hear.