Laura Mills was diagnosed with cancer when she was 16 years old, now 34 Laura shares her story and what life is like living with the late-effects of cancer.“I was studying for my GCSEs and I started feeling really tired. I put it down to revising and because I was organised I put a lot of work in. But when I started getting bruises and becoming a bit jaundiced, I thought yeah, that's not down to revising. “Her Mum took her to the GP who sent Laura to hospital for blood tests. The same evening she had a call asking her to go back for more tests.“I’d already been reading a woman's story in a magazine about her leukaemia journey. She was in her 30’s, I was 16 and I didn't really know a lot about kids getting cancer, but I knew you could. But I didn't put two and two together straight away. We got to the hospital and next thing we were referred to the haematology ward and an oncologist came to see me. And the first thing he said was, I am going to take some more bloods and if they don't tell us what we need, we're going to do a bone marrow biopsy. And as soon as he said those words, I knew what it was straight away. As soon as he left, I said, Mum I’ve got leukaemia and she's saying don’t be silly no you’re fine you’re just anaemic. But I knew. The next day I had to have a bone marrow test and that night I got told. So it all happened within two days"TREATMENT:"At the start I did a month's chemotherapy in Liverpool. You have a nebuliser to protect your chest from the chemotherapy and after the first month, you’re supposed to have another one. And for some reason, my one was forgotten, there was a blur of tests and other things and it just got missed. And then one night, I started having fits. They told me mum that they needed to send me to Christies for radiotherapy, the leukaemia had gone to me brain. And then at this point, about a couple of hours before I was getting transferred, I declined really rapidly. “"I got chronic pneumonia and septicaemia and on the way to Christies’, they noticed that things were getting worse. So I think I was in Christie's for a couple of hours when the oncologist there said to me Mom, she needs to fight now, or she's not got very long left, we need to send her to Wythenshaw intensive care or she's not going to make it. I was there for two weeks, all chemo was stopped while they pumped me full of all sorts of crazy things to try and get me working again.” "Two weeks later I came out and got to Christies. And everything started again. ...Christie's gave me an option, do I want to carry on the three years in chemotherapy or do I want to have a bone marrow transplant? I chose a transplant, seemed a quicker option so I went with that one.So then all I just needed intrathecal, which is a chemotherapy into the spine to go directly to the brain. They discovered that I've got two tumours on my brain but they don’t know if that came from before the leukaemia or the leukaemia travelled to me brain. They've never known, they never did a brain scan for it, so they’re still there now but they’re non-malignant. ..and then I .. went in for the transplant in 2003. They warned me that you could be in for about six to nine weeks, depending on how well you react. I was in for 3.5 weeks, I was one of the quickest people that got through a transplant. My counts started coming back quickly ... and so far, my transplant’s been good to me. “SUPPORT IN HOSPITAL:"Christies were fabulous. They’ve got a house built for the families called Victoria House. And they've got rooms, a kitchen so they can go and they can go to sleep and make themselves some food and things like that. I mean, most of the time me mum stayed with me, but she always went there to freshen up. But if my family came up, they were always able to go off there to get some space and things like that, so the room wasn't too crowded. … we had two social workers that were absolutely amazing. And like for when I went home they organised a new bed for me because me old bed was a mess and because I'd lost a lot of weight and become more jaggedy boned, they wanted me to have a better mattress. “NO ALL CLEAR + LIVING WITH CANCER"But I've always been told, that I've got a very high chance of having a cancer recurrence; breast or cervical or ... leukaemia. So they've never actually officially said, oh, you're all clear. So it is a bit disheartening. But I keep a look out for signs now, It's just one of those things."It's hard because I've got people who say to me, oh, you've finished your chemo now, get over it. But even if you've not been told, like I've been told that you're going to get a recurrence, it doesn't go away no matter what. Once you've had it, it's with you forever. You're always no matter what, you're always going to have a worry of it coming back even ten, fifteen years down the line. Every little lump, every little niggle, every little bad blood test. The journey is never over. Once it's been in, it doesn't go away. You can feel more positive about it. You can feel I've beaten it and I've gotten past a certain hurdle, I've gotten past 10 years, have gotten past this. But you will still always have that feeling that its lingering. And there's a chance, even if you've rung the bell and you've not been told you might get a recurrence, it's just one of those things that you feel like it lies in wait sort of thing. “LATE EFFECTS:Laura has developed late effects from the drugs she was given to treat her cancer; serious health conditions that require fresh tests, diagnosis and treatment from the NHS."I'm a walking after effect, basically, and my consultant for the after effects clinic, ....Every time I see him it is a new one for the list and or I give him a new one he's not heard of which is great as well.”“I started with neuropathy during the treatment which is from ‘vin christine’ [a chemotherapy drug], which is one of my big passions of telling people about. I tell a lot of people about 'vin christine’ because a lot of people don't know what it does to them. And that's left me with problems with me legs so ... out of the house I'm worse I need a wheelchair, I can't get about with my arms, with my feet, legs, my lower back and the nerve damage is now affecting my stomach.I went into hospital two years ago with excruciating stomach pains, and they thought it was collitus. I have had tons and tons of various tests and everything single test has come back negative. And it gets so frustrating because all they say to you its IBS and I'm like, it's not IBS, I'm telling you right now I've had IBS my whole life, this is something completely different. Until me and the GP sat down and went through it together ... And I've been doing some research on my nerve damage...I discovered that it can affect other parts of your body than just the limbs, … and when I see it can affect your stomach I was quite shocked. I rang my late-effects doctor the next day and he was like, Oh, yeah it’ll be that, like I should've known this all along. And it was like after two years of struggling to get a diagnosis and having test after test. And then he just was like, yeah, its that. Oh, my God....if someone has said to me, 'vin Christine’ can do other damage than just your limbs, I’d have had an answer so long ago, I would not go have had to through all these tests. But you don't know about these things until you do some research. “"The symptoms change daily, so a lot of a lot of it is nausea and the tablets don't work for it no more so I have to inject medication and a lot of times I don't feel hungry, so I have to inject to feel hungry otherwise I won’t eat. ““What are the other late effects? Oh yes chronic kidney disease that started last year. Well, it was it was a shocker, to be honest, because I had what I thought was the flu. I went to me GP, they sent me for blood tests … and a chest x ray. And that night he phones me. He says Laura we’ve got an ambulance coming to pick you up, you’ve gone into kidney failure. I’m like, don't be daft, I've just not drunk enough I'll be fine, just stay at home and I'll drink. And he's like, no, you're in kidney failure you need to go into hospital.So I went in by ambulance and as soon as I get in to A+E, this girls fussing about me and I’m like, I'm fine. It's just a little water infection and she's like, no love. Next thing, I wake up the next day and they've got a catheter in and they tell me that I've got sepsis and full blown kidney failure. So I say, oh, okay. Maybe it wasn't a water infection. That was February last year. I just didn't notice but the same thing happened in November. I went to the Dr’s offices again, feeling tired, and he was like it can't be the same thing but we'll do bloods and we'll do a chest xray. He rings me again that night; Laura its Kidney failure. And you go in.”“And then next thing I wake up and I’m in this really confused state, and nothing feels real and I feel like I'm in a bubble and I don't know what's going on. And apparently what'd happened was, I was on morphine for me pain in my legs and because my kidneys have stopped working, I've taken my medication that morning and the kidneys didn't flush it through properly, all me tablets together, not just the morphine had flooded my system and overdosed me. So I woke up the next day and I was like in a different room, in a different ward they just said we had to give you the drug, you didn’t like it because it was unpleasant but you needed it otherwise, you know, you could have died and you've gone into kidney failure, you've got sepsis again and you've got pneumonia. I was like, oh well, twice in one year this is marvellous.It was very strange having kidney failure twice in one year, so they said I must have chronic kidney disease and the kidneys get triggered by infection and fail. So I’ve got to be really careful of infection, which is why I'm on lockdown, because if I get Corona I’m more than likely going to get kidney failure. So its more fun.”EDUCATION + WORK:"I wish I'd gone past the GCSE exams but I was too ill and the exam board said I could have my mock results as me results. I wanted to study. At the time I wanted to work with kids, early learners and I had a place in Southport college but because of my low immunity, kids wasn't going to be ok for me.”"I didn't know after that what I wanted to do anymore and with the fact that I wasn't well, a lot of the time and disabilities I couldn't figure out where I wanted to go with things ... I studied massage for a while because I liked holistic studies and studied reflexology … and I made friends but I never went back into proper education because I lost a lot of memory and concentration, which I still have problems with now.I don’t know if that’s anything to do with the tumours but I've heard this a lot from other people. I think they call it chemo brain, they find it difficult to concentrate on things for long periods of time. It takes me ages to read a book now, whereas I was a person who could read a book in a day and I can’t do things like that anymore. ...I did apply for tons and tons of admin type jobs, but no one would take me without any qualifications,... but when they see that I have problems with disabilities and a lot of people don't look at you when they've got someone who can do the job without any disabilities and without any health issues, they go with them first. So I've not had a lot of luck on that side of things.PEER/ SURVIVOR SUPPORT:"I'm a person who likes to know what's possible, … And I'd have liked to have known what possibly could happen to me in the future by talking to someone about it and about their experiencesTo me, I'd have loved to have been able to have someone to say, you know, I'm not trying to scare you about this but this is a possibility and you need to be prepared for that. Or, I went through this and it was scary but you can do it.And I've spoken to people myself after they've been diagnosed. And I've obviously not told them too much scary stuff, but I’ve told them about being positive and try to keep busy and make sure you drink plenty of water, usual types of stuff. But further on during the treatment, I’d have liked to have spoken to someone who started having problems and after effects, because that would've been nice to know. Scary to find out on me own.”...I’m one of those people who at the time knew everything, every single tablet that I was taking. One night the Dr gave me a wrong tablet and I chased him down the corridor and said ‘that’s the wrong tablet’ and he looked it up and said you’re right. I’m one of those people knows the ins and outs of my treatment: what chemo it is, what bags are going up and a lot of people the age of being 13 and 12, they want to know the conditions and the treatments. I’d want to know what my future could entail even if its scary because at least I’d know what signs to look out for and I think others would feel the same way. They know the ins and outs of their treatments and their own body now and to have that information in front of them: that’s the type of chemo I had and that could happen, I can look out for that or oh I’m having those symptoms it might be this then they can go to the Dr ask him is it this because this is an after effect or is it something else and it can be less worrying then.CANCER ON THE CUSP OF ADULTHOOD:"I think I grew up that minute I was told, I was slightly older anyway because I was revising for GCSEs, but I think the minute someone tells you you’ve got cancer everything just changes. Because you’re either facing life and surviving or death so you’ve got to grow up and take charge.You’ve got to fight so you become an adult that second and there’s no choice about it, you’ve got to do it for your family because they’re looking at you, they’re willing you to fight because obviously they don’t want to lose you.So after that I couldn’t go back to being a stroppy teenager because I’d already grow up so I think I probably missed out on a bit. I missed out on obviously crazy nights being a teenager. But I’ve also made a lot of fantastic friends, I’ve learnt a lot about myself and a lot about other people and about how people can be when you’re facing something serious, you learn who your real friends are.So I don’t think I’d change anything even though I’m living with what I’m living with, I’d still not change anything. I don’t think any of us would even though sometimes its, I don’t know, it’s a life changer ... Its strange, if you ask any of my friends, they probably wouldn’t change anything either which is weird. It grows you up, matures you. You miss out on stuff but you become mini adult the minute you’re told. “