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Ruby was just 14 months old when she was diagnosed in 2010 with rhabdomyosarcoma, a rare form of cancer which affects only around 60 children a year in the UK. Ruby had to have operations, 9 cycles of chemotherapy and we had to go over to Jacksonville, Florida for Ruby to receive 28 sessions of proton beam therapy. Ruby was free of cancer in May 2011! Ruby had regular MRI scans and X-rays and all was fine, until she found a lump herself in her sternum in December 2019. We were at the hospital with a couple of hours of finding the lump. Ruby had X-rays, scans and blood tests done. Next step was a biopsy. We were told over and over that the docs didn’t think it was anything sinister, but a mother’s instinct told me they was wrong 😔. We received the devastating news on 14th January 2020 that our little girl again had cancer. After meeting with the surgeon, he was confident that he could remove all of the cancer with an operation and no chemo would be needed this time. He managed to do that on 22nd January during a 7.5hour operation. The surgeon removed 3/4 of her sternum, parts of her muscles and cartilage. Ruby spent a week on the high dependency unit, where she was completely bed-bound. She couldn’t hold her head up without us supporting her. She was connected to all sorts of wires and she had a VAC suction machine/dressing attached to her. This was meant to help with closing the wound.

Ruby’s skin is very badly damaged from the proton beam therapy so it was really struggling to heal. She has had to go to theatre and have a general anaesthetic every single week for over 7 months. The surgeons thought the wound had finally closed at the end of August so removed the VAC. Unfortunately this isn’t the case. Ruby had another operation on 10th November and had the VAC put back on. As the VAC isn’t going to heal the wound it has been decided that she needs to have a major operation with some plastic surgeons. We are waiting for a date for this surgery 💔Ruby