‘Our world has been turned upside down again’
‘Our world has been turned upside down again’
A mum “just knew” what was wrong with her daughter after she had a fit and collapsed during class. Lucie-Joan Fagan had been in her first week of high school after two years away while she was treated for a rare form of brain cancer.
The 14-year-old had only recently been given the all-clear to return to school following a successful operation to remove “100 percent of the tumour”. Days later, just as she was beginning to experience normal life as a teenager, she was rushed to Alder Hey Hospital were she was told an aggressive tumour had grown in another part of her brain.
Lucie, from Bootle was first diagnosed with ependymoma, a growth of cells that forms a tumour, in March 2021, at the age of ten. The family had to relocate to Manchester so Lucie could undergo proton beam therapy – a precise form of therapy that targets the tumour itself – at Christie Hospital.
READ MORE: Police officer ‘headbutted’ by teenager on HalloweenREAD MORE: EncroChat dealer ‘Jack-Nicklaus’ created amphetamine ‘farm’ but ‘struggled with process’
Just months after finishing treatment and ringing the bell, a scan revealed a second tumour on her brain. After undergoing further successful radiotherapy treatment at the Clatterbridge Cancer Centre, Lucie was recently able to return to school for the first time in two years.
But during her first week at senior school, just before her 14th birthday, an MRI scan confirmed the devastating news the cancer was back for the third time. An MRI scan revealed the cancer had returned, and Lucie was rushed in for emergency surgery for eight hours. Doctors were able to remove 100 percent of the tumour, and Lucie was discharged on her birthday.
Her mum, Jayne Fagan, said she “just knew” the cancer had returned. She told the ECHO: “I told the doctors before the MRI scan I knew it was a tumour. I could tell by her eyes and her face. You know your own child.”
Now, Lucie must return to the Christie Hospital for further proton beam therapy, as doctors have said Lucie’s body is “too weak” to undergo further radiotherapy. This means she and her family will have to relocate to Manchester for six weeks over Christmas.
Jayne, who is a full-time carer for Lucie, said: “She’s only just grown her hair back from her last treatment. Being 14, she’s really worried about losing her hair, and losing the friends she’s made.
“She thought it was gone for good and I think we had that feeling of hope. Now it’s back her life’s upside down again. It feels like we’ve gone one step forward ten steps back.
“Right now, she’s upbeat. She never cries, she’s just smiling through it. Me and her dad try to take the burdens off her to try and make her life as normal as possible, like every other kid. But it’s hard because she can’t go out with her friends, she can’t go to school.
“As soon as you get your foot out the door and you start to live life again, it comes back. Our lives are controlled every single day by cancer.”
Since 2021, when Lucie was first diagnosed with cancer at 10 years old, all the family’s savings have gone on her treatment and trying to create a normal life for her and their three other children. Jayne said: “All our savings, every penny we ever had was spent when she last had cancer.
“There’s no financial help available. We have to spend all Christmas and New Year [in Manchester] with no income whatsoever. We’ve got two lives to live for six weeks. We’ve still got to pay bills at home.”
Their eldest daughter Lacey, who is 16, is staying at home with her auntie so she can finish her GCSEs. Jayne said: “We have to split the family up over Christmas. It’s really heartbreaking. It’s meant to be a happy time.
“I just feel so heartbroken that she’s got to go through this again. Some people don’t go through cancer once in their lives and this is our third time now. It’s hard.”
Ependymoma, which is a rare and reoccurring form of cancer, prevents the family from living a “normal life”. Jayne told the ECHO: “We just look at tomorrow. We take it day by day. We can’t plan to go the swimming baths on Saturday, because we don’t know what Saturday is going to bring. We can’t plan anything with our other children in case Lucie is sick.
“Our world has been turned upside down again. We’re heartbroken all the time. It’s taken its toll on us as a family. We were saving up to buy a house and that money is gone now. It was a shock to say the least.”
Lucie, who Jayne says “has more courage than any adult” she knows, has an incredibly positive outlook. “She looks at it as her fourth chance at life, which some people don’t get. She says you have to trust the process.”
Jayne has now set up a GoFundMe in a bid to raise money to pay for the family’s costs while her daughter is receiving treatment. Anyone wishing to donate can do so here.
