Missing baby daughter ‘hardest part’ for mum In cancer treatment
Crystal Bale might have thought her first Mother’s Day would start with breakfast in bed. But she never envisaged it being a hospital bed, without her 11-month-old Zoey.
Nor did she expect to miss her daughter’s first steps last week, nor be the hairdresser that would shave her mother’s head as a sign of solidarity with Bale’s pending hair loss.
“Not being with Zoey is the hardest part about this whole thing,” the 28-year-old says, from her isolation room at Waikato Hospital. “I FaceTime Zoey at least once a day but she doesn’t understand why I am not there to cuddle her.”
Doctors sent Bale to hospital, concerned about her mental health, lethargy and lack of appetite. It was on a second trip two weeks later on March 14 that the same tests showed the blood cancer acute myeloid leukaemia (AML).
Bale started chemo only a week later but it was a month before she was allowed to return to her Whitianga home on April 16. She returned to Waikato Hospital for more treatment on April 21, and has been there since.
Having missed Mother’s Day today, she hopes she will be well enough to see Zoey for her first birthday next month alongside her husband Ethan Hobson.
“This is not something that you ever think you'd have to deal with, but I'm really lucky because between Mum and Ethan [they] alternate and spend a few days with me and with Zoey.”
The next step is for her have two more rounds of chemotherapy, then a bone marrow transplant. The family hopes that Bale’s brother Aaron, 25, will be a suitable donor. If he is, it will carried out in Auckland where the family will need to be based for at least four months.
Devastated to watch a former volunteer firefighter fight for her life, the Cooks Beach brigade has dedicated its climb in next weekend’s Firefighter Sky Tower Challenge to her. Bale was a third-generation volunteer at the station, with her mother Donna having served for 17 years, and her grandfather 22 years – adding to 51 years between the trio. Both Donna’s parents died of cancer.
The Cooks Beach Station’s team competing in the 1103-step challenge is made up of another family – Bruce Smith and his children. Hugo, 17, and Mila, 16, were not even born when the Sky Tower challenge started 20 years ago. This will be Hugo’s second climb, and a first for Mila who for many years has been the ‘patient’ in simulated accidents when volunteers were training.
More than $1.2 million has been raised for the 1100 participants and 242 brigades taking part on May 18, with firefighters in full kit, and Squad 51 made up of “civilians’” wearing 25kg of kit, up the 51 flights.
Bale has been overwhelmed by her local community’s efforts, including not only
fundraising for Leukaemia & Blood Cancer NZ through the Sky Tower event, but also donations for her family who have been forced to quit jobs, put their business on hold and contemplate months of recuperation.
“It means so much and I'm honoured that Cooks Beach are dedicating the run this year to me,” she says. “I grew up at the
station, it’s been a part of our family. It just makes it so meaningful.”
Several of Bale’s family and friends have shaved their heads to show their support. Bale is a hairdresser and shaved her own head, and mum Donna’s too. The 56-yearold is amazed at how her daughter is coping.
“She is so freaking strong, she's blown me away,” says the mother of three and owner of the Cooks Beach Store. “We're not a type of family to ask for help – but the reality of what they will need has set in. Crystal has seen the donations come in, she has cried. But they need all they help they can get.”
Leukaemia & Blood Cancer NZ chief executive Tim Edmonds says the Firefighter Sky Tower Challenge is an important event for the charity, as it helps fund support services for blood cancer patients.
“Seeing the faces of people who the fire stations dedicate their run to is a poignant reminder of what the event is about – raising funds to ensure we can fund research and support the thousands of people living with a blood cancer.
“Since the event started 20 years ago, firefighters across the country have raised more than $14m before putting themselves through the physical challenge of climbing to the top of the Sky Tower. They do it because they want to help Crystal and thousands of other New Zealanders living with blood cancer.”