My husband Iain died of bowel cancer on 7th January 2017. The cancer had already spread before he knew he had it. He was a year too young to have had screening. I miss him every day of my life. We had a beautiful son called Callum who was 22 when Iain died. The worst part of it all was having to tell Callum that his Dad was not going to make it.  When Iain was unwell I had not even one phone call from my siblings to ask how we were getting on. They acted as though cancer was catching. The only person who helped us was my Mum. She gave me £400 to buy a car which was easier for Iain to get in and out of, an old banger Alfa Romeo sportwagon. We spent a lot of time on the ward for the chemotherapy. But Iain was so allergic to the first drug they tried that he immediately went into anaphylactic shock. This meant that a whole group of drugs were not good for him and the chemo drugs they tried, did nothing at all.  When they said they were going to stop the chemo because it was not working, that was when we knew he did not have long to live. So we went to the Isle of Arran in Scotland to see our best friends, and then we went to Wales because Iain said he wanted to see some mountains.  In July last year my mother died.  My son Callum is so sad over his Dad and his beloved Granny. And then I took an overdose and almost died myself, I was in intensive care and then a psychiatric unit. Callum dropped out of University when his father died, and he does not want to go back. He decided to get an official diagnosis for his autism, and he became an expert on the subject. Then he read some stuff on the internet about autistic adults getting stuck in mental institutions for years and this has made him afraid to get help for his difficulties, not that there is much help out there, we have found. There is a local group but they meet at a noisy pub and Callum hates noisy pubs.  Cancer is a terrible thing and it is frighteningly common now, what can be causing it, is it the pesticides we eat in our food? Iain's bowel cancer happened where he had a plastic hernia repair, could this have caused it?

Best wishes to you all

Vambo