Laure & Mattia Shine Night Walk 2019

Thanks for visiting our fundraising page and taking the time to read this story. On September 21th, Mattia and I will walk 21km across London to pay homage to my Mum, Marie-Line, whose life has been taken too early by cancer and to collect funds to make that one day this terrible disease will be just a small bump in the road of life. Last month, my Mum lost her battle against the cancer. She discovered just after Christmas that she was suffering from a lung cancer, which had metastasized to the brain and the adrenal gland. The doctors, conscious of the seriousness of her condition, tried everything they could to stop the progression of the disease and prolong her life. Driven by love for her family and determined to see her beloved granddaughters grow up, she has been fighting during eight months, enduring pain, tiredness and side effects of the treatment without never any complaint. However, the cancer had already been deviously progressing for months or maybe even years, and my Mum entered the battle with a clear disadvantage. Despite her very strong will to leave, she took her last breath on August 13th after three weeks in hospital in palliative care. She was 58 and always had a very healthy, active and smoke-free lifestyle. Yes, it is too young, too unfair and I am upset. However, I have made a promise to myself to turn this anger into energy and commitment to do anything I can do at my little level to help beat cancer. This is why we will be walking this half marathon on the 21st and why we are calling for your generosity. I want the funds we will be collecting to go more specifically to early and better diagnosis. If my Mum had found out earlier about her medical condition, her chances of survival would have been much higher. However, in the absence of any symptom (she never experienced any particular coughing or shortness of breath) and with regular normal blood test results, it was impossible to detect the lung tumour before its migration to the brain, causing the first symptoms of verbal and spatial confusion. The message I also wanted to pass to everyone reading this page is to take care of your loved ones and never minimise or neglect any unusual pain or tiredness. These can hide something more serious and, tackled early enough, most conditions can now be cured thanks to the huge progress made by the medicine in the recent years. Thanks a million for your generosity. Together we can beat cancer!