A Donegal woman diagnosed with Acute Myeloid Leukaemia is urging people to get involved with the Irish Cancer Society’s Daffodil Day.
It was June 2021 and Roseena Doherty had a temperature and sore throat that wouldn’t go away.
After testing negative for Covid the Clonmany woman was prescribed a course of antibiotics by her GP.
A short while later though and Roseena began to feel too ill to get out of bed. When she was unable to swallow food or fluids she was taken to Letterkenny hospital.
From there she was transferred to Galway University Hospital where she underwent further tests.
Doctors diagnosed her as having leukaemia which would require four rounds of chemotherapy and a bone marrow transplant.
On Daffodil Day, March 24, Roseena said that prior to being diagnosed with Acute Myeloid Leukaemia, it was a condition she knew absolutely nothing about.
“I met other patients with leukaemia who had symptoms like tiredness and bruising but that wasn’t my experience. I had a sore throat and a temperature.
“Sometimes with a cancer diagnosis, we think we have to be very brave. When people say to me that I’m dealing it with very well and that I’m so positive, I would say we all have our harder days with our diagnosis, no matter how we look.
“There can be a day when something just hits you out of the blue and maybe for ten minutes you’ll have that cry. But then you’ll just dry yourself off and you get on with it again.”
On top of funding life-changing cancer research, the Irish Cancer Society provides vital services and supports to patients and their families across Donegal each year.
Last year these included 171 free counselling sessions, 188 nights of in-home night nursing for cancer patients in their final days and 480 free lifts to get patients to and from their chemotherapy appointments.
The Irish Cancer Society is calling on the public to take part in any way they can to show solidarity and support for anyone affected by cancer, and says that this year’s Daffodil Day is their most important yet.
As well as donating at Cancer.ie and volunteering to help fundraise, people can purchase items from the Daffodil Day online shop and take part in a Steps Challenge. For more information visit www.Cancer.ie/DaffodilDay.
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