Layla takes on Sugar Free February

My Story

Thank you for visiting my first ever fundraising page 🤗 I’m starting 2020 in a very unsweetened way by taking part in ‘Sugar Free February’ in order to raise money for Cancer Research UK with your help, kindness and generosity. ⬇️ What’s inspired me to fundraise? ⬇️ I’m fundraising in memory of my Mum and Grandad and in honour of other people close to my heart as well as all those affected by cancer... My beautiful and brave Mum was sadly diagnosed with breast cancer in 2008. After a mastectomy, chemotherapy and other treatments, she thankfully went into remission. However, on 25th December 2013, my Mum suddenly passed away. My family and I were broken. Our lives painfully fractured and torn apart. Anybody who has experienced loss and bereavement will know these dreadful feelings and emotions, sadly, all too well. From the coroner’s report and thorough investigations by a number of Doctors - we found out that there were a multitude of reasons, many complex, but one of the biggest factors for her sudden death was because she suffered a pulmonary embolism. This was found to be most likely caused by the hormonal therapy medication that my Mum was prescribed to reduce the risk of the breast cancer coming back. It’s completely not my intention to put anybody off of hormonal therapy drugs or to minimise the brilliant advantages of them. What my Mum took did indeed prolong her life. Unfortunately, she was one of the unlucky ones where it also increased the risk of her suffering from a fatal blood clot in her lungs. This is why I’m fundraising for Cancer Research UK in her memory. I had 5 more wonderful years with my Mum and I’m so thankful. However, I know there’s still a tremendous amount of work and research to be done to increase cancer prevention, improve cancer patient care, treatments, life expectancies and to fulfil Cancer Research UK’s “vision [...] to bring forward the day when all cancers are cured”. Similarly, my Grandad, who was and still is one of my biggest heroes, was diagnosed with Burkitt Lymphoma at the end of May 2019. Burkitt Lymphoma is a rare and aggressive form of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma and is a cancer of the lymphatic system. He responded really well to his first round of chemotherapy but after his second round... he took a turn for the worse and separate issues were exacerbated as a result. My Grandad went into palliative care and passed away surrounded by family on 2nd July 2019 at the Bristol Haematology and Oncology Centre. It was an extremely distressing time for my Grandad and for us to see him look so unwell and ravaged by cancer. We felt helpless and I wouldn’t wish what he experienced on the last days of his life on anybody. This is why fundraising is so important to me as nobody should have to suffer from the effects of cancer. 🍰🍫🍭🍿🍩🍦🍬🍪 Sugar is my downfall and I’ll go so far as to say that I’m addicted to the stuff. 🥴 You’ve just got to take one look at me to see that! But I’ll be taking on the challenge by ditching the sweet stuff and giving up on processed and added sugar in order to raise money for Cancer Research UK in memory of both my lovely and sorely missed Mum and Grandad. I appreciate you all work extremely hard and that donations won’t always be possible so I’d be really grateful if you could help in other ways by sharing my page or link to the Cancer Research UK website in order raise awareness. https://www.cancerresearchuk.org Every penny makes a huge difference to vital cancer research so thank you so much for helping however you can. My goal is to raise £1000 in which £500 would be in memory of my Mum and the other £500 in memory of my Grandad. Here’s to a very Happy New Year full of good health, happiness and joy. Layla xx Ps, thanks if you stuck around and made it until the end of this mini (or not-so-mini) essay!!!