Our Dream Trip Turned Into A Cancer Nightmare

Naomi Brown thought she was going to the airport, but her mum had other ideas.

- Elaine McLaren & Louise Baty

Opening my wardrobe door, I pulled out dresses, tops and jeans, selected my favourite heels and comfiest trainers.

Then I placed them in the bulging suitcase at my feet. It was November 2015, and in the morning my husband Adam and I were going on a holiday we’d been planning for months. New York had always been top of our dream destinations but we’d never had the money to go. Then the unbelievable happened. ‘Let’s enter this,’ Adam had said, reading about a competition on a pack of M&Ms. ‘First prize is a trip to New York.’

Incredibly, weeks later we’d been contacted to say we’d won. Since that day we’d been planning our itinerary, including a bus tour of the city, a stroll around Central Park and a shopping trip to Tiffany. With our flights and six nights in a hotel included, plus spending money, it was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. If only I wasn’t so tired...

I’d been feeling rundown for weeks. During my lunch breaks at the children’s nursery where I was deputy manager, I’d find myself nodding off. I’d also noticed a strange loss of sensation – almost like a fizzing – under my right cheek. Worried about the air pressure in the plane’s cabin worsening my symptoms, I’d visited my GP. He had diagnosed sinusitis and prescribed congestion relief tablets.

Feeling so tired