Hello Friends!
For most 21-year-old women, a trip to a spa or the theatre are a nice way to spend a weekend. But for Stephanie Knight these are her precious dying wishes.
The student, from Braughing, Hertfordshire, has been bravely battling cancer since she was 17 years old but learned on New Year's Day this year that her condition is now terminal.
So she decided to draw up a list of things she would like to do in her final months.
Brave battle: Stephanie, pictured left before she was diagnosed with a rare cancer, and pictured right today...
Stephanie, pictured in hospital, has refused to give up fighting her cancer and plans to set up a local charity to help other teenagers with cancer
Unusual requests include learning how to de-cork a bottle with a sword and to hold her own fake wedding.
'She has always wanted to get married and have lots of babies but has found it hard to have a partner while undergoing treatment, despite being a very pretty girl,' her sister said.
'She wants to at least have tried on dresses and had a hen do before she goes. It doesn't matter that it's not for real.
'We're planning to go all out for the hen do. The local landlady and our friends have been talking about naked butlers or maybe even a stripper - if Steph allows it.
'Steph was too young to come to mine and was having treatment when our older sister got married.'
But many of her requests are modest ones - she would like to finish her course and qualify as a nursery nurse and watch a sunset in a beautiful place.
Stephanie (right) is pictured enjoying a night out with friends before her treatment. She lost her hair following chemotherapy...
She would love to go on holiday with her family and dogs, to the seaside with her nieces and nephews and to enjoy a 'normal' drunken night in the pub.
Perhaps more poignantly many of her wishes are for others. She wants to arrange for her sister to meet Gary Barlow or Robbie Williams and take her father to meet the Manchester United squad.
Another wish is simply 'to make someone's cancer experience slightly happier to get through.'
Her sister Rachel Cross, 31, said: 'Steph is such a selfless person. For her it's more about memories for us as well as fun experiences for herself.
'She wants us to have good memories of her rather than all the hospital memories.'
Miss Knight was diagnosed with Ewings sarcoma in 2009 after doctors found a tumour the size of a tennis ball in the back of her pelvis.
By the time treatment started it had grown to cover the whole right side of her pelvis.
She responded well to 10 rounds of chemotherapy and three lots of radiotherapy in the first year and went into remission in October 2010. She returned to college to complete her second year of her child education course and started working in a local nursery.
Stephanie is determined to enjoy her life despite often being in agonizing pain due to the cancer. A common side-effect of treatment is weight gain...
Stephanie has achieved one dream already of meeting David Walliams and Amanda Holden from Britain's Got Talent
But just as Stephanie and her family were hoping she had turned the corner, they discovered the soft-tissue cancer has returned. She started chemotherapy again in April 2012 but this time it failed to work.
In October last year she had her right leg and part of her pelvis removed but after the surgery doctors found the cancer has returned to her stump.
Two previously benign tumours in her lungs had also grown nearly an inch each.
On New Years Day doctors told her and her family they would not be able to save her life and could only now try to prolong it as much as possible.
Rachel said: 'New Years' Day was awful. The doctors said Steph would never be free of the cancer, but they would manage it as best they could.
'They told us the cancer had returned to her amputated stump and chest and lung area.
'Then 10 days later a consultant confirmed the cancer was terminal but they would do what they could to keep her with us for as long as possible.'
Stephanie with a new relation: She was diagnosed with cancer at the age of 17...
Stephanie lost her leg to cancer in October last year (right). But after the surgery they found the cancer had returned to her stump.
Stephanie has had another round of chemotherapy and is due to have two more in the next three months in an attempt to prolong her life. She was given a nerve blocking treatment this week, which has taken away the pain from her stump and will hopefully enable her to attempt some of her bucket list wishes.
She was inspired to draw up the bucket list by friends at the Teenage Cancer Trust Unit at Addenbrooke's Hospital, Cambridge.
Rachel, who is a mother-of-three, said: 'She has spent so much time in hospital and she feels that she has wasted it. She is determined not to waste any more time.'
FROM SEASIDE TO SUNSET: STEPHANIE'S BUCKET LIST
- To go on a holiday with all my family - where we can all be together and be alone - with dogs
- Go to the sea side - 2p machines with friends and family esp Nieces and nephews
- To jump out of an aeroplane strapped to an instructor
- Complete my childcare qualification
- To laugh until I cry or my body hurts
- Watching the sunset in the most beautiful of places
- Too watch Britain got talent and meet Amanda again
- Too have spa days and a girls spa weekend
Steph would love to to meet Gary Barlow or Robbie Williams and wants her sister to share the treat - To have a hen night
- To make someone’s cancer experience slightly happier to get through
- Take my sister niece and mum to see Wicked at the theatre
- Big shopping spree
- Afternoon tea
- Cocktail nights
- To get my sister to be able to meet Gary Barlow or Robbie Williams
- Make full use of cinema card (stop wasting money lol)
- 'Normal' drunken night at the pub
- Fireworks
- To be able to drive again
- Be able to go to work
- To meet Dynamo (the street magician)
- Concerts
- Too have a shopping centre all too our selves me - the family - and friends
- Posh sleep over - big house - catered food - cinema room - beautician - comfy beds lol
- Comedy night - Russell Howard would be great
- To learn to sword cork
- Spend a stress free family day
- To eat really lovely food
- Walk the dogs - dogs need training (HELP)
- All inclusive 5* Holiday
- OPI nail varnish all different colours and shades and files - really too have the ultimate nail kit
- Too meet Kate & Prince William
- For me and my dad to meet the Manchester united team
- For me, my brother, brother-in-law and sister to meet the Tottenham hotspur team
- Take to many movies and laugh a lot
Stephanie also plans to set up a local charity named Steph's Wishes to help teenagers suffering from cancer by providing essential equipment for rehabilitation.
She has already helped to raise more than £40,000 for the Teenage Cancer Trust since 2009 - the charity which funded Ward C9 at Addenbrooke's Hospital.
Rachel said: 'We are determined to fight it for as long as we can and to help her do all the things she wants to do.'
Culled from The Daily Mail UK...
xoxo
Simply Cheska...
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