The family of an Ayrshire mum-of-three diagnosed with incurable cancer just days before Christmas have launched a fundraiser to help alleviate the financial pressures of living with cancer.
Two-time cancer survivor Helen Crawford, from Girvan, was given the devastating news in December that breast cancer has been detected in her bones, known as ‘metastatic’ or ‘secondary’ cancer, for which there is treatment but no cure.
The 39-year-old was first diagnosed with thyroid cancer in 2014 — just months after the birth of first daughter Lily, now eight.
A year later in 2015, she was diagnosed with breast cancer during the pregnancy of her twin daughters Robyn and Scarlett, aged seven.
RAF nurse Helen, who is from Girvan but currently lives in the Lincolnshire barracks with husband Phil, underwent intense chemotherapy, radiotherapy and a five-year course of ovarian suppression treatment with annual mammograms seemingly in the clear.
But a bout of neck and back pain, finding a tiny lump above her clavicle and severe chest pain pushed Helen to A&E where she was given a scan.
Helen told Ayrshire Live: “I presumed that because my mammograms were fine that I didn’t have anything to worry about.
“But actually, the secondary breast cancer are little cells which have broken off from the primary tumour, spread already but have somehow managed to evade the chemo and radiotherapy.
“And they’re so small that they haven’t been picked up from any tests at the time.
“I didn’t know anything about it [secondary breast cancer] and I had primary breast cancer and I’m a nurse.
“Why did nobody tell me I was still at risk? Because if that was the case, as soon as I’d had this neck and back pain, when there was no injury or reason for me to have it, then I would’ve gone ‘get me a scan, get this checked’.”
Thirty-one women die every single day from secondary breast cancer in the UK.
The average life expectancy after diagnosis is one to three years.
Helen is now on a mission to raise awareness of secondary cancer in hopes of gaining traction for funding into research and clinical trials.
She said: “It’s not out there the way that primary cancer is — and I’m not taking away from primary because of course that’s massively important, but people know to check their boobs and check for lumps.
“We need to get more money and research and find more options for women like me in this horrific position.
“We want to raise awareness and hopefully get people talking and pushing things to get more drugs to clinical trials.
“Look how quickly we managed to get the Covid vaccine to clinical trials and research done. When the funding, attention and effort’s there, things can be done. We need a similar level of attention done to this awful disease.
“It’s just shocking there’s such a disparity of treatment and lack of support out there.
“These women carry on with their lives knowing, potentially, what their future is going to be like.
“There’s not really any escaping it.”
A fundraiser has been launched on Helen’s behalf by her sister Emma Gilchrist, who lives in Girvan, with a £100,000 target to help with the financial pressures of life with cancer.
Those pressures include treatment abroad should Helen need it following her NHS treatment; money for a home as Helen and her family live in rented, temporary accommodation in the RAF married quarters; and funds to make memories with her girls.
Family and friends plan to do a variety of activities, including the kilt walk, to add to the total.
Emma said: “We want to have backing behind Helen that if a potential treatment — whether that’s a trial abroad or enhancing her own treatments — or if they were in a position to buy a house, that money could be used towards that in making it such a special place.
“Helen’s living with cancer, she’s in pain everyday, she’s had umpteen hospital and doctors appointments, she has to keep a diary to remember to take certain medications; all of that is so draining.
“This is her new normal.
“Helen some days feels okay then other days feels terrible, so on the days that she does feel okay being able to just say ‘Come on Phil, girls, let’s go to the safari park or the pictures’.
“Being able to have that financial freedom to not have to plan, to just be able to say ‘I’m feeling really good, let’s go for a day out’, and building memories.”
Helen added: “It’s about having money there that should we get to that position, we’re not then like ‘I’ve literally got three months to live, I need this treatments, let’s try and raise £50,000’, because by that point you’re shutting the door after the horse has bolted.”
Twenty-five per cent of the cash raised will be donated to charity MET UP UK, a patient advocacy group supporting secondary breast cancer patients across the UK.
You can donate to Hearts & Hope 4 Helen here.
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