‘We can’t wait to spend Christmas stuffing our faces, in festive jumpers’

HELLISH YEAR FOR MUM AS HER HUSBAND FOUGHT CANCER AND BABY HAD HEART SURGERY

AFTER a hellish year, Emma Anderton is looking to the future and cannot wait for Christmas with her family.

The 39-year-old will be celebrating her husband being in remission from cancer and her baby daughter surviving life-saving heart surgery within weeks of each other.

First diagnosed with follicular lymphoma – a very slow-growing form of blood cancer – about six years ago, salesman John Anderton, 53, was closely monitored and only required treatment after being hospitalised with pneumonia in late 2019, when doctors discovered the disease had spread.

Starting months of chemotherapy in January – much of it experienced alone because of Covid-19 restrictions – he and his wife, Emma, were delighted to be told he was in remission in August.

John, who lives in Leicester with Emma and their daughter Evelyn, 19 months, said: “Doctors told me there was no sign of the disease in my body, so we popped open the champagne and thought that was the end of any drama for our little family.”

But three weeks later, their only child Evelyn – conceived using IVF – became unwell and was taken to Leicester Royal Infirmary, barely conscious.

Tests eventually confirmed she had Brugada syndrome – a rare genetic condition that causes disruption to the electrical impulses that keep the heart beating. Days later, she was fitted with an internal defibrillator.

With her husband and daughter now recovered after a hellish year for the family, Emma said: “It feels very strange to look back over the past 12 months. It feels like I’m looking at someone else’s life.

“Everything went so horribly wrong for us in such a short space of time, but we’ve got through the hard times and can’t wait to spend Christmas just the three of us, stuffing our faces in our festive jumpers.”

Evelyn is doted on by her parents, who spent five years trying to get pregnant, only for Emma to miscarry in April 2016.

In 2018, after beginning IVF, Emma fell pregnant with twins. One was Evelyn, but the other was ectopic, growing in the fallopian tube, which can be very dangerous.

With no choice but to have the embryo surgically removed at seven weeks pregnant, Emma said: “That in itself carried risks to Evelyn.

“I worried she wouldn’t make it – but she survived. She’s a little fighter.”

Simultaneously, John had been coping with health issues, which started six years ago when he saw a doctor about a growth in his right side, which turned out to be harmless fatty tissue. But a scan also detected a tennis ball-sized mass in his abdomen, which a biopsy confirmed to be follicular lymphoma.

John said: “The diagnosis was a shock, because I didn’t feel unwell at all. The mass was almost found by accident. I was placed on active monitoring, which is essentially just watching and waiting.”

Then, in late 2019, when Evelyn was just a few months old, medics discovered John’s cancer had begun to progress and treated him with chemotherapy once a month from January.

Emma struggled, as the coronavirus restrictions meant she could not be by his side at the hospital.

She said: “It was tough, as he had to almost go through it alone. But we tried to stay positive – that’s how we’ve got through everything so far.”

Finally, at the end of August, doctors told John he was in remission. But in mid-September, Evelyn became very ill. Emma recalled: “I assumed she just had a simple bug or something. But within minutes of getting home, she went really floppy and lethargic.”

She was taken to Leicester Royal Infirmary where her heart rate shot up.

Thankfully, medics stabilised Evelyn and she was transferred to the more specialist Glenfield Hospital where she was diagnosed with Brugada syndrome.

She had surgery to fit her with an internal defibrillator – a device that monitors heart rate and corrects abnormal rhythms. “That operation was the hardest thing I have ever had to go through,” said Emma. “The surgeons said Evelyn was the smallest person they had given a defibrillator to.”

By sharing their story, they are calling for more in-depth genetic screening in newborns, so conditions such as Evelyn’s can be picked up earlier, and to encourage people to support the British Heart Foundation, which has been an invaluable help to them.