Emma: I’m dying so I will take a bow now...
BESTSELLING author Emma Hannigan – who has battled cancer ten times – heartbreakingly revealed yesterday she does not have long to live.
In an emotional online post about her illness, Ms Hannigan, a 45-year-old mother of two, wrote on her website: ‘My medical team have thrown everything but the kitchen sink at this but all avenues now have been exhausted.
‘To say that I’m heartbroken doesn’t begin to cover it.’
Ms Hannigan discovered in 2005 that she carried the BRCA1 gene, which gave her an 85% chance of developing breast cancer and a 50% chance of developing ovarian cancer. As a preventative measure, she had both breasts removed and both ovaries removed in 2006 in an attempt to prevent cancer from developing.
Despite her best efforts, Ms Hannigan was diagnosed with cancer in the neck, shoulder and under her arm in 2007. She has since fought the disease ten times and had multiple rounds of chemotherapy and radiation.
The cancer came back most recently in late 2017, so the writer, from Bray, Co. Wicklow, is beginning to say her goodbyes.
In her post, she spoke about her love for her children Sacha and Kim, and her husband Cian.
She wrote: ‘Faced with very little time can I tell you what screams out at me? Love. Nothing else has much meaning any more. Just the love I feel for the people I hold dear. My two babies (OK they both tower over me, but I’m still allowed call them my babies), my husband, my parents, my family, my friends and readers.
‘[You] have championed me and held me in your virtual arms. The love in my heart is all that matters now. I am brokenhearted at having to say goodbye so if it’s all right I’ll say farewell instead.’
She also said: ‘Life is so very precious. We never know the day or hour it will be whipped away.
‘So fill your days with as much happiness as you can muster.’
Ms Hannigan’s books include The Wedding Promise, The Perfect Gift and The Secrets We Share. She also hopes her readers enjoy her new book, Letters To My Daughters.
She said: ‘Usually I’d spend a few weeks chatting about it and inevitably daring to wonder if you’d like it. I sincerely hope you enjoy it.’ To finish her post, she wrote: ‘Farewell and thank you, I am taking a bow. Until we meet again may all that is good and decent be yours. Love and light.’
Last night her agent was uncontactable for comment.