Angry mums ready to fight with a killer

Ceri Rodgers is angry. She is angry that cancer is affecting her friends and family.

And when she heard the news that yet another of her friends had been diagnosed with cancer she decided she had to do something.

She set about getting a group of like-minded women together to help fight the disease which was taking their family and friends.

“As I get older, so many people around me are being touched by cancer in one way or another, whether watching someone we love suffer or living with cancer ourselves,” explains Ceri.

“After finding out yet another friend had been diagnosed last year, a mum herself, the anger I had been feeling for a numbers of years reared its head.

“Angry that cancer was stealing from everyday good people of all ages – it is unrelenting.”

Ceri says she felt compelled to do something.

“I approached a number of local like-minded mums who had had their own experiences, they were immediately on board.”

And it was no coincidence that most of the women are mums themselves.

“We all know the drive and strength that each mum has at her core and the power we have in reserve when needed – well with a bang SMAC (Sheffield Mums Against Cancer) was born.”

“We are all motivated to make a difference and play our part in fight against cancer,” says Ceri, 39, who has two children, Lily, nine, and Archie, four.

“Our primary goal is to raise much-needed funds for Sheffield-based cancer charities. This year we have chosen St Luke’s and Weston Park Hospital.”

Ceri, who worked in the recruitment industry before going freelance, is a keen runner who has raised money for both organisations in the past.

She lost a close friend, Paula Wright, to breast cancer in August 2012 at the age of 42 and another friend, Karen Squillino, has been diagnosed. That was the final spur to create Mums Against Cancer.

“Enough is enough,” she says. “We are a group of feisty women who mean to get something done.

“Not just for research and development of treatments and cures, but also for the people who are dealing with cancer today which is why we are supporting Weston Park and St Luke’s.”

Karen, who also lives in Norton and is mother of nine-year-old Sophia, has just finished her treatment for breast cancer.

“I found a lump in my breast last summer and I started treatment in September,” says Karen. “After the biopsy and operation I was told although I had caught it early thanks to my husband making me go to the doctors, it was a very aggressive form of cancer.”

Karen underwent gruelling chemotherapy followed by radiotherapy which she finished this month.

“I was very fit and healthy, I run and go to the gym and have a health diet, it was just one of those things.

"My little girl Sophia was only eight at the time and we have always been very honest with her. We are very tight community here as lots of our children are in the same class and that has been a real support.

“When Ceri told me what she planned I didn’t hesitate to say that I would help. We all have different skills and busy mums just have a way of getting things done,” says Karen, who works for the NSPCC.

Also in the group is Amanda Miles, of Norton, who has had more than her fair share of dealing with cancer.

He daughter, Annie, was diagnosed with a retinal blastoma when she was just 14 months old and had to have her eye removed and chemotherapy.

Now, aged nine, Annie is fine although she does have to go for regular scans.

“She has an amazing artificial eye and you wouldn’t know it wasn’t her own,” says mum of three Amanda.

Then dental nurse Amanda lost her mother-in-law, father-in-law and friend Paula to cancer all in the same year.

“All three were in St Luke’s, which is why it is a cause so close to all our hearts.”

However, cancer has become an even bigger part of Amanda’s life. she was diagnosed with breast cancer herself nearly three years ago.

“I was 39 when I was diagnosed,” she says. “I ended up having radiotherapy on my 40th birthday.

“I am now 42. If it wasn’t for fund-raising groups like SMAC I wouldn’t be here. All their fund-raising goes towards research into this terrible disease which has affected so many of us and at such a young age.

“Ceri is amazing and it is just great to be surrounded by such positive women who really want to make a difference.”

Paula’s daughter Jess Wright has given her backing to SMAC.

She was just a teenager when her mum’s breast cancer returned and took her life.

“We never really talked about it much after the cancer came back,” says Jess, now 20.

“I think she was protecting me. She would really have liked what Ceri and the other women are doing, And I really want to get involved to and do what I can to beat this terrible disease.”

Sheffield Mums Against Cancer was officially launched at an event at Baldwin’s Omega last Thursday.

Other events are planned including a Dads’ Golf Day & Cook off, teams running the half-marathon and potentially a Brides’ Ball toward the end of the summer. They are also organising a Time for Tea event to raise funds for Weston Park Cancer 
Hospital in Sheffield.

• www.facebook.com/sheffieldmumsagainstcancer