Banbury bowel cancer woman raises £60,000 for treatment

Abigail Watson was inspired to get a check up because of Dame Deborah James and Adele Roberts

A woman with terminal bowel cancer said raising more than £60,000 in a week to pay for treatment not available on the NHS was "really overwhelming".

Abigail Watson, 44, said she was inspired to get a check up from her GP after being touched by the stories of Dame Deborah James and Adele Roberts.

"We hope this treatment will work," she told the BBC. "I would love it if it just gave me more time."

The teacher from Banbury, Oxfordshire, is now booked in to begin treatment.

Kat Goodsell, a friend and neighbour, found out about dendritic cell vaccines.

She suggested crowdfunding to cover the costs but was surprised how successful it turned out to be.

"I don't think I've cried as many happy tears in a long time as I did over that period of time," Ms Goodsell said.

"It's like getting a hug every time someone donates," Mrs Watson added.

Mrs Watson's friend Kat Goodsell suggested crowdfunding to help cover the high costs of the treatment

Mrs Watson, who is married to husband Dave and has two boys, Samuel, aged 10, and Finley, seven, put down the aches she was experiencing to ovulation period pain, but had an "inkling" it could be something worse.

"I had been following Dame Deborah James - Bowelbabe - for a number of years, " she explained.

"It was actually when she passed away that I suddenly got quite scared and thought this really does need investigating."

She said it was starting to feel like she was "getting signs" when during a trip to a spa last Summer she also spotted Radio 1 DJ Adele Roberts on the cover of a women's health magazine.

Within five weeks Mrs Watson, who has the auto-immune disorders polymyositis and hypothyroidism, was undergoing a colonoscopy.

She said: "As soon as the examination was over they asked: 'Have you got someone with you?'

"And obviously when they ask you that, you know. And in my head I had already processed it, I knew."

What are bowel cancer symptoms?

• A persistent change in bowel habit - going more often, with looser stools and sometimes tummy pain

• Blood in the stools without other symptoms, such as piles

• Abdominal pain, discomfort or bloating always brought on by eating

Source: NHS UK

After getting her terminal diagnosis she also had to break the news to her children.

She said: "We tried to explain that it wasn't going to be immediate, I wasn't going anywhere tomorrow or the next day.

"But at some point Mummy wouldn't be here anymore, and that was the hardest conversation."

Mrs Watson was told her cancer was a particular mutation and very aggressive, which meant a limited chance of survival. She has been offered palliative chemotherapy.

"We have got that on the backburner for starting in September/October-time, but it is maintenance, and it is just as long as the body will take it," she said.

There was a "sense of time is slowly running out", she added, which is why she was pleased the special treatment could start soon.

"I'm not sad about dying, I'm not scared about dying, I've had an amazing life, I've done so much, I've seen so much of this world," she said.

"I'm just really sad that I might not see the children grow up, and be with them when they get their first heartbreak, and when they fall over and they run to you that won't be me."