Antony’s Story

Antony’s Bout with Brain Cancer

2009 Round 1 – After having a seizure, Antony was admitted to hospital and given a cat scan which revealed the devastating news that he had a brain tumour.

2011 - Round 2 – After being under the care of Professor Kane for two years, sadly Antony’s condition had worsened. He was having multiple seizures per week, at times having a number of fits per day. Something needed to be done. Antony was referred to Mr Chumas at Leeds General Infirmary and he performed an awake craniotomy to remove the tumour. The operation lasted for 12 hours, once the surgeon had removed his skull, he was woken up and a physiotherapist and speech therapist were present to see how he responded to the different parts of the brain the surgeon was touching and removing. The operation was successful and the surgeon was able to remove 90% of the tumour, unfortunately due to the position of the tumour they needed to leave 10% of it, as it was embedded against his motor strip and if damaged this would have meant left side paralysis of his body.

2015 - Round 3 – After a couple of years and repeated scans every 6 months, Antony again received some more devastating news when he was told that the cancer was growing again and beginning to once again fill the void left by the removal of the tumour in 2011. He was given a 12 month cycle of chemotherapy.

2016 - Round 4 – The chemotherapy hadn’t had the effect the oncologist had hoped it would and Antony had to undergo 12 weeks of intensive Radiotherapy, this required him to move to Leeds and attend St.James hospital for treatment every day Monday to Friday for the duration of his treatment. Throughout his treatment Antony got up and went to work every day as he was determined to try to get on with life as normal and is a very proud man who wanted to continue to provide for his family. A true warrior. The Radiotherapy had caused a lot of hairloss and the steroids he was taking to reduce brain swelling had caused him to gain a lot of weight. The Radiotheraphy had worked in stopping the cancer progressing any further and after a couple of months he had grown some of his hair back.

2018 - Round 5 - At the end of 2018 after a scan the oncologist was so pleased that Antony’s condition had been quite stable since the Radiotherapy that he suggested he went up to yearly scans as there had been no change over the last 2 years. This gave Antony a massive boost of confidence.

2019 - In January this year, Antony was working out in Belfast when he started to get a lot of numbness down his left arm and was struggling to lift his left leg to walk. His left hand side of his mouth was dropping, he had difficulty chewing and speaking. When he arrived home he looked as though he had had a stroke. He was given an emergency MRI and was told that the Tumour had not only grown, but was very aggressive and had increased in grading to a high grade cancerous tumour. He was given a high dose of steroids but was told that his limited mobility is due to the growth of the cancer in to his motor strip and there are more tumours beginning to grow around the original site – they referred to it as a ‘nasty looking scan’. They are unable to operate again as they think they will do more harm than good. He cannot have any more Radiotherapy because of the high dose he has already received in 2016 so they are once again trying him with a 6 months course of chemotherapy.

Determined not to be beaten, Antony has switched to a full alkaline diet to aim to starve the cancer of the sugar it needs to survive. He has researched in to an alternative cancer fighting, life saving treatment which is available at the Budwig cancer centre, Malaga, Spain. This however, is going to be extremely expensive and we are trying to raise the funds to pay for it to get Antony the treatment he truly deserves.

Throughout his illness Antony had fought hard to live a normal life, he has worked hard and hasn’t let his illness stop his ambitions and visions. Now that Antony cannot work due to his illness it has meant that he is going to have to sell his family home as he will be unable to meet the mortgage payments each month without a salary. Before Antony was diagnosed at 24 he hadn’t taken out any life insurance or critical illness cover, and after his diagnosis no one would insure him. Antony has a lovely fiancé Helen and two beautiful girls Scarlett age 10 and Sofia aged 6. They keep him going and he is fighting to stay alive to watch them grow up as they need their Dad around.

We are asking for your help for this amazing family to donate to this fund to help get the treatment he needs. We do not want to let Antony be told he is terminally ill at age 34 and not put up the best fight we can to keep him alive. He is lots of heart and strength, he is keeping positive even in a time of great adversity. A true hero and an inspiration to many.