Slater Clifton’s dream came true!
There were smiles all round when this cancer battler got to be a policeman
It’s hard to imagine a more brave little boy than pintsized Slater Clifton. The four-year-old has already spent more than half his life in hospital after being diagnosed with brain cancer.
“Slater was only 17 months old when doctors discovered the tumour, and from that day, despite being prodded and poked and having endured so much, he still manages a smile,” single mum Bianca Walker tells Woman’s Day from the family home on the Gold Coast.
In early 2016, Bianca, 42, realised her little boy was not like the other children she’d see in the park. He had an abnormal head tilt to the right, and was constantly losing his balance.
At first he was wrongly diagnosed with an ear infection, it would take weeks to find out
Slater suffered a posterior fossa ependymoma (cerebellum and brain stem), which accounts for around six per cent of childhood tumours, and affects one in every 1.4 million children.
“Raising awareness around child brain cancer has become my mission in life. It’s the biggest killer of our children by disease and no family should have to endure the unimaginable pain that comes with such an insidious and horrible thing,” Bianca says.
FIGHT FOR LIFE
Doctors were able to remove 80 per cent of the tumour, backed up with intense chemotherapy over the next six months. What followed was a series of brutal treatments that saw him rushed to intensive care many times, fighting for his life.
“We almost lost him two or three times – it was touch and go for months, and every day I would wake up gripped with fear wondering if today was the day... there are no words.
“Any parent reading this would agree that if doctors say your child won’t see his seventh birthday, and that at best he has a 10 to 20 per cent chance of surviving the next three years, of course you spiral into meltdown.
“But you have to have faith and hope – something I have in truckloads thanks to the amazing support from my beautiful family,” explains Bianca, who says her mum Lynne, dad Lyle
and sister sistermelanie Melanie are her greatest supporters. Slater’s rough road to recovery continues with more invasive tests focusing on his inability to swallow solids. Fed via a tube, this little boy would choose am a mandarin over a burger. “He sucks on them, and a when he’s about to go under anaesthetic, I wrap them in paper towels and dab them around his nose
– his little eyes light up, and it warms my heart to see just how fearless he is,” Bianca says, holding back tears. Under the specialist care of respected Queensland paediatric oncologist Dr Tim Hassall, young Slater’s selection in a clinical trial out of the US’ St Jude Children’s Research Hospital in Memphis has given mum Bianca new hope.
‘Mummy not now – no time for crying around here!’
“These next few months are critical. You try everything. You never leave any stone unturned. I want him to know his mum did everything possible to save his precious life,” she says.
In the meantime, Slater is not interested in anything sad, and even his doctors believe it’s his extraordinary resilience that could prove to be his secret weapon to beat the cancer.
“He’s a very kind little boy. He’s always so upbeat with
the other sick kids – and he’s really funny! Whenever he sees me get a bit teary, he says, ‘Mummy not now – no time for crying around here!’”
Bianca is so grateful for her close-knit community on the Gold Coast, and when local Coomera police and firefighters heard about Slater’s plight, they invited the youngster to join them for a day as an honorary junior recruit.
“He wants to be a policeman when he grows up, so this was the best day of his life – a dream come true. I want to be able to give him every possible chance, no matter whether it’s three days, three years or three decades,” says the proud mum.
To help, visit gofundme.com/ slatersfightagainstbraincancer and for more information, go to childrens.org.au/ braincancer