Joe Gilligan

It was during Joe’s gap year that persistent headaches began and in March 2008 he was diagnosed with a Malignant Brain Tumour. When a Doctor delivers the news that your child has Cancer you immediately hear things like, “It must be your worst nightmare” – “its not fair he should be out with his friends enjoying himself” – “I don’t know how you are coping” all these things are true but what you feel deep down inside is hope! We hope the chemotherapy works, we hope the Radiotherapy works, we hope the consultants are leaving no stone unturned. We were a normal family with everyday problems who found ourselves thrust into a frightening world. Suddenly the word Cancer was in our lives, we were spending weeks in hospital having Surgery, Chemo and Radiotherapy.

As usual, Joe was accepting, good humoured and never complained. In fact, he didn’t ever complain about this burden. We didn’t once hear ‘why me’ or ‘this isn’t fair’ not only did he just get on with it; he had a smile on his face and became a mentor and friend to the other young people on the cancer unit. We lost Joe on September 29th 2009.