THE MOST POIGNANT PROMISE
Brother pledges to raise dying sister’s baby boy as his own
GRAEME Abbott’s promise to his dying sister was the ultimate example of brotherly love.
Nicola Abbott, 2 , had given birth against all the odds after going through chemotherapy, but knew a year with her ‘miracle’ baby boy Archer was all she had left.
Despite having two young boys of his own, the doting brother offered to raise Archer as one of his own when his sister’s brain tumour could be fought no more.
The sacrifice allowed his sister to die peacefully on Saturday, knowing her son would be in the best possible hands.
A grieving Graeme will now take one-yearold Archer home to Glasgow to fulfil his selfless pledge. Speaking before her death, Miss Abbott said: ‘It’s a huge relief knowing he will be with my family, having seen how my brother has brought up his sons.’
Baby Archer was born on August 31 last year and single mother Miss Abbott described him as ‘a miracle’ after doctors told her the chemo treating her glioblastoma multiforme tumour would make her infertile.
When she learned she was pregnant, she was determined to have the baby despite the risks – but last weekend she finally succumbed to the cancer. Graeme, 30, and his wife Christina, 2 , will keep Archer under an arrangement known as ‘special guardianship’ and in three years can adopt him.
The Sainsbury’s worker, from Springburn, Glasgow, said: ‘Nicola’s main goal was to make it to Archer’s first birthday.
‘In April she was told that she had six weeks to live, but she was determined. It is exactly a year that we were told the cancer was terminal. She had a birthday party for Archer in July as she didn’t think she would make it until the end of August.’ The family went camping in the Lakes to celebrate three weeks ago, with balloons and banners.
In her final weeks, Miss Abbott was able to see her baby learn to crawl at her home in Fleetwood, Lancashire, and take his first steps, with her parents around to help care for her.
Graeme, whose sons Elijah and Aaron are two and one, said: ‘She was always happy, but in the past couple of weeks she was the happiest she’d been for a while.’
Bravest album of all – Pages 22-23