A bride's promise

Three hours before my wedding, I got a devastating phone call Nell Cordukes, 24, Kendal

- FIONA KINLOCH, CAROL DYCE

Peeking round the curtains, I saw who I was looking for.

‘He’s here!’ I shouted.

It was summer 2013, and my mum Becky, then 50, was meeting my boyfriend Matt, 22, for the first time.

I couldn’t wait to introduce my two favourite people.

Within minutes, Mum and Matt were cracking up over embarrassing childhood stories about me.

They were going to get on just fine...

I’d always been close to my mum.

Me, my sister Camille, 28, and my brothers Thomas, 26, and Harry, 21, were her world.

Playing board games or walking our Border collie Floss and Cavalier King Charles spaniel Rosa, time together was everything.

And from that day, Matt was part of the family, too.

By June 2019, it was like he’d always been one of the gang.

But Mum had begun acting strangely. She was dizzy, forgetful...

The doctors diagnosed her with stress and exhaustion.

But then she ended up in hospital.

Confused, she didn’t know who or where she was.

The doctors thought it might be a stroke.

But after an MRI scan, they called us all in.

‘I need to show you something,’ a doctor said.

Staring at the big, white blob on the scan, I was in shock.

It was a brain tumour.

On 4 July, Mum underwent surgery to remove 70% of the tumour.

But a biopsy later showed that it was a highly aggressive glioblastoma.

‘I’m afraid she may have just months left,’ the doctor said.

We were all broken.