I was covered in so many I looked like I’d been hit
GRADUATE TELLS OF CANCER BOMBSHELL AFTER TRAVELLING TO COLOMBIA FOR
A GRADUATE has revealed how her ultimate adventure became an unholy nightmare when she was told her “jetlag” was in fact leukaemia so aggressive it had invaded 90 per cent of her blood.
Ella Dawson, 23, had just jetted to Colombia, South America, for a seven-week backpacking trip of a lifetime.
Putting the exhaustion, nausea and dizziness she experienced shortly after arriving down to jetlag, it was only when mysterious bruises sprang up all over her body, that Ella, from Huddersfield, saw a doctor in the city of Santa Marta.
The medic sent her for a series of blood tests - resulting in her leukaemia diagnosis in August last year.
By then too sick to fly home, she recalled: “By the time I got my diagnosis, I was so unwell that I was expecting a bombshell. But it was such a chaotic situation that I almost didn’t have any time to process everything. I was thousands of miles away from home, having to use my phone to translate, while doctors explained what was going to happen.”
She is now undergoing a complex and innovative treatment called CART, which removes and “reprogrammes” her blood cells to fight cancer.
Ella added: “Even now, I still struggle with the idea that I have cancer. It almost feels like there’s a stigma around it, especially when you’re young and, on all of the leaflets I was given, everybody looked so unwell and depressed.
“It’s not been easy, but I’ve been determined to make the most of the good times and strive for moments of normality when I can. It’s what’s got me through.”
Looking back, Ella believes her cancer symptoms first began to show in around April 2019, when she returned home for the Easter holidays and felt run down and fatigued. She put her symptoms down to final year stress.
In addition, since she was young, Ella has had an underactive thyroid, which can also cause tiredness, muscle
I’ve been determined to make the most of the good times and strive for moments of
normality
aches and weakness, according to the NHS. She was soon distracted by thoughts of the seven-week trip around Colombia she had planned with a friend. But in the weeks leading up to her departure, she became increasingly worn down and kept catching bugs and colds.
She said: “I saw the doctor to be on the safe side and she took my blood pressure. Everything looked normal, so I was told it was likely just the heat making me feel faint.
“The day I left for my trip, I looked and felt absolutely knackered, but I just kept telling myself that once I got there and relaxed, I’d be fine.”
Instead, touching down in Bogota - the Colombian capital - Ella felt so exhausted that she spent the first three days of her trip in bed. She said: “I could barely walk, let alone get out to explore. I spoke to the staff at the hostel where I was staying and they reassured me that, because Bogota has a high altitude, a lot of people struggle to acclimatise when they first arrive. That, plus the jetlag, made perfect sense, so I didn’t worry too much.”
Ella began to rally and was able to