Interview 18

Age at Interview: 17

Sex: Male

Age at Diagnosis: 11

Background: He is a full time A levels student. He lives at home with his parents and sibling. His experience of cancer has inspired him to want to study medicine.

Brief outline:Diagnosed with Stage I Non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL), in 1999. Treatment chemotherapy. In 2001, diagnosed with Stage III of NHL. Treatment chemotherapy, including high dose therapy (BEAM), intrathecal chemotherapy and lumbar punctures. In remission.

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Feels a bit guilty because when he relapsed his parents concentrated on him and he thinks that his younger sister felt left out.



I think I maybe felt guilty for sort of hogging all the attention from my parents. I felt guilty towards my sister because perhaps I wouldn't say she got pushed aside but you know the attention was mostly on me because of what I was going through. So yeah I felt slightly guilty that, probably my sister felt that she wasn't getting quite as much attention as you know it was, she probably deserved and that, that's certainly true but I think she, she knows why, certainly. But yeah.

Those feelings were present the first time or the second time that you were diagnosed?

Particularly the second time because for a long time up to the run up of my, my diagnosis the second time I was really ill anyway because the second time I think I let it, I let it go too far before thinking that it could be cancer again. So I spent sort of a month and a half, two months in absolute pain with my parents sort of you know helping me all the time even though I hadn't been diagnosed. So the period of time for which I was hogging the attention the second time was, was longer than the first time.
Teenage cancer

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