Patient stories

"When you hear the word 'cancer', you just think you're not going to live anymore."

"We had a fair idea of what it could be... we were just hoping it wasn't."

“Only certain people can cope with that. People who love you.”

"I’ve had to rebuild myself in the past and I’m doing it again now. I know I can do it.”

“My doctor gave us the news, and…everything just felt really hollow. It was a big shock.”

“Someone said to me, ‘It’s amazing that you haven’t had a break down yet.’”

“She took me into the room and she sat me down with a haematologist. And they said, ‘Yep. You’ve got cancer. It’s a blood cancer.’”

“When they said that he had blood cancer, I just broke down. The very first thing that ran through my mind was… my son is going to die.”

“See, it’s funny with blood cancer…you always find an explanation for your symptoms. You never think it’s blood cancer, you think it’s something else.” 

“It’s taught our family so many things. We’re all in this together.” 

“Sometimes even now, I think in the shower – ‘Today, am I going to find a bump that shouldn’t be there?'"

“I remember these nurses with purple gowns holding a bucket labelled ‘TOXIC’, to give chemo to Liem. I was like, ‘What is going on? Chemo, for my boy?'”

“The doctor said, ‘This might hurt, yell if you wish’, and my wife Janet said my language was very colourful!”

“Hearing that I had Hodgkin lymphoma was emotional. I was glad that I was in Auckland and could distract myself.”