Some brave people have told their stories this week and they could help someone else
Five important real-life health stories from this week everyone needs to read
- A mum-of-five who was advised to double her hormone replacement therapy (HRT) after her symptoms were mistaken for perimenopause has said her diagnosis still feels like “a dream”. Crystal Portsmouth, 50, from Wiltshire, had been suffering from chronic anaemia, painful periods and exhaustion for years, but was told by her GP that this was due to fibroids – non-cancerous growths in or around the womb.
READ MORE: ‘They told me to double HRT mistaking incurable disease for menopause’
- The mum and dad of a toddler given a “blindsiding” diagnosis at just one year old hope she will lead “as close to a normal life as she can when she’s older, but we’re not there yet”. Ava Grace, now three, is the daughter of Vicki Cooper-Bird, 37, and Ian Bird, 40, who received the devastating retinoblastoma diagnosis – cancer of the retina – shortly after her first birthday in 2023.
READ MORE: ‘Our daughter’s eye changed in matter of hours before diagnosis left us in tears’
- Jude Keil was a healthy and happy nine-year-old lad who loved swimming, cycling and snorkelling in the sea. But he fell into a coma after going into respiratory arrest. The young lad from Sittingbourne, Kent, spent 300 days in hospital as medical teams tirelessly “turned over every stone” to help him.
READ MORE: ‘Our son was happy and healthy until he was 9 and now he breathes through a tube’
- A British teenager with a rare form of cancer had her life saved by blood taken from the umbilical cord of a baby born in Spain 12 years earlier. Lyra Cassell, now 20, underwent the unique transplant at the age of 16 after being diagnosed with precursor T-cell lymphoblastic leukaemia.
READ MORE: ‘I was dying until blood from baby’s umbilical cord cured my cancer’
- Abi Smith initially dismissed her double vision as a result of cabin pressure during a flight to the US in June 2019. However, when she began losing mobility in her legs and the ability to hold objects like kitchen utensils, she sought medical help.
READ MORE: ‘I put double vision down to flight before they gave me terrifying diagnosis’
