Chepstow woman’s Race for Life is tribute to husband

11:50am Friday 23rd March 2012 in News

TWO years after her husband died of stomach cancer, his wife Jo Rees, with her family and friends are backing the Race for Life in memory of him.

less than a month before being diagnosed with stomach cancer Barry Rees was playing five-a-side football regularly – but within four months of diagnosis, he was dead.

Jo, 38, still struggles to comprehend the speed with which the disease took her husband from her and their two children Luke, six, and four-year- old Amelia.

she admits to days when she feels like “climbing into a dark cupboard and not coming out”. but she is also confronting the hurt and despair head-on, by corralling friends into taking part in Cancer Research UK’s Race for Life, to raise money for research.

Mrs Rees, of Chepstow, said her engineer husband, was physically fit with a healthy lifestyle, and they did not even consider cancer as a possibility.

“He had some symptoms with indigestion the previous autumn, but it had been a stressful year for us both and we suspected a stomach ulcer,” she said.

“It wasn’t until Christmas that he started to get really ill. He became very weak, to the extent that he couldn’t even hold a screwdriver to assemble the children’s Christmas toys.”

mr Rees was admitted to the Royal Gwent Hospital on Boxing Day 2010, and the diagnosis came two weeks later. Stomach cancer can be particularly difficult to detect, and thus to treat, as symptoms often only manifest themselves once the disease is well-established.

“The cancerous cells were in the stomach lining, so there was no obvious tumour or growth. Barry understood the consequences, because he had researched stomach cancer as a possibility when he first became unwell,” said Mrs Rees.

“I was totally unprepared though, and just couldn’t take it in.

“The implications for me and our children, who were two and four years old at the time, were im-mense.”

After two full cycles of chemotherapy, mr Rees began then stopped a third, as the cancer was not responding, and the couple felt it was robbing him of his quality of life.

Mrs Rees recalls a “nightmarish”

time, wanting to be there for her husband and the children.

“I’d often stay up all night with Barry, then drive home to be there for the children in the morning. I don’t know how I got through it,” she said.

“My friends and family were great though, often just popping round with food because I didn’t have much time or energy for cooking.

“The hospital also helped, providing a bed so I could get some rest while with Barry.”

Mrs Rees also had the heartbreaking task of breaking the news to her children, and was helped to prepare for it by a support worker from St David’s Foundation Hospice Care.

“I wanted to be open and honest with them and explain the situation in terms they would understand,”

she said.

mr Rees died on April 7, 2010, aged just 37.

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Praise for urology staff at Wycombe Hospital

4:04pm Thursday 15th September 2011

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A RETIRED businessman has paid tribute to staff at Wycombe Hospital who treated him for prostate cancer, and urged other pensioners to get themselves checked out.

Anthony Calladine, 66, was shocked to be diagnosed with the disease after taking a blood test on the advice of a friend.

he had no symptoms and had never even been to hospital before.

Wycombe Hospital has a specialist urology ward and after a ‘speedy and efficient’ series of tests , including a biopsy, ultrasound and bone scan, Mr Calladine, of New Road, High Wycombe, had his prostate removed last month.

he said: “I want to pay tribute to the consultant, Mr John Kelleher, and all the doctors and nurses who were exceptional in their duties.

“It’s not an easy department to work in and they’ve all got my sincerest respect.”

“Prostate cancer is a killer because many people are reluctant to take a test. I want to try and get people to do what I did.

“Please take my advice and have a blood test…it does not hurt or cost anything but if you don’t bother very serious problems can occur.”