I thought my two-year-old son was just being clingy – he was actually battling stage four cancer
Little Teddy Mascaro, two, from London isn't even allowed to play in paddling pools because his immune system is so weak - so instead he holds his hand under the taps
LIKE many mums, Emma Mayo was delighted to share snaps of her pregnancy and birth on Instagram.
And when Teddy arrived in December 2016, Emma, 34, a teacher from south London didn't stop.
But then the unthinkable happened - Teddy developed stage four cancer...
But instead of turning away from social media, brave Emma, who is married to Jamie Mascaro, 37, used it to raise awareness of the realities of childhood cancer, detailing Teddy's highs and lows.
She's developed a loyal following with her candid and .
Here she speaks exclusively to Fabulous Digital about her amazing 'SuperTed':
After I fell pregnant with Teddy, who was born in 2016 I started documenting his journey on Instagram. It was just for friends and family – I only had 400 followers.
I put up pictures of myself pregnant and cheerfully captioned them. On December 11, 2016, I wrote: “D Day's arrived and nothing to report.”
Then, on December 22 at Kings College Hospital in south west London, Teddy entered the world. “Exhausted but elated,” I wrote. “Little T Bear has arrived! Not a glamorous photo but this is the reality of childbirth!”
Everything was documented… his little feet, pictures with his grandparents, playing on the swings.
Then, in April, 2018, not long after his first birthday, Teddy was diagnosed with stage four, high risk neuroblastoma – a childhood cancer which forms on the nerve tissue.
I told my Instagram followers that too. It wasn’t an easy decision but I needed to make people aware of the reality of how cancer affects children.
“Here is our darling Teddy this morning,” I said. “Hooked up to machines and very poorly. On Tuesday, after weeks of illness and being told he had a virus, he was admitted to hospital after a large tumour was found in his abdomen.
“On Wednesday we received the news we’d been dreading. Cancer. It’s almost too much to bear writing this.”
I’ve told my 15,000 followers the reality of his treatment. How it is heartbreaking for him to be prodded with needles and go nil by mouth all day, when he is so little.
“Try explaining to a 16 month old that they can’t have any ‘gotgot’ (yogurt) when they are wildly pointing to the fridge and requesting it,” I told my followers.
I explained how he given steorids and they affected mood, making my cheerful little boy who loves horses angry and miserable.
Teddy’s treatment means he can’t see his little pals. I breastfed him for 14 months, something I was so proud of, and he had all his vaccinations but it doesn’t matter now – the high dosage chemo killed all that.
He can’t play in paddling pools so likes to hold his little hands under the taps.
Teddy's treatment means he can't paddling pools so likes to hold his little hands under the taps.
Emma Mayo
Teddy started being poorly about February 2018, but he’d just started nursery so I didn’t think much of it.
The GP said he thought it was just a virus, saying it was common to get viruses when children start nursery. But for a little while he wasn’t quite right.
He stopped wanting to crawl, became clingy and lost weight – his appetite had gone.
Eventually I took him back to the GP. She took one look at him and realised he wasn’t well at all – but she didn’t know what was wrong with him.
We were sent straight to A&E at Kings, the same place I’d delivered him, where he had blood tests and it emerged he was anaemic. They also felt a tumour in his abdomen.
I later learnt that was attached to his adrenal gland and his kidneys and measured 10cm by 10cm by 10cm – considering how little he was it was astounding you couldn’t spot it.
He was admitted straight away. I think they suspected cancer immediately. It was terrifying. Some doctors spoke of a benign tumour, trying to give us hope, and we clung to that. But in our hearts of hearts we knew.
Initially they thought it was a Wilms tumour, a cancer of the kidneys which typically occurs in childhood and which 90 percent of children survive. We researched it and were devastated, focusing on the one in 10 that don’t.
We were then sent to cancer centre the Royal Marsden in Sutton, Greater London, where we met another consultant. Teddy was too ill to attend but we received worse news. It was more likely to be neuroblastoma.
At that point she said he probably had a one in three chance of survival.
We were devastated and in total shock. He needed to be moved straight away to St George’s Hospital in Tooting, south London, but he was too poorly to go immediately.
At this point, I was convinced he would die. It was the worst time in the whole experience.
Things quickly went downhill. He was getting thinner and thinner. It was dreadful seeing my lovely little boy like that.
He immediately had surgery. We thought it was the worst thing that would happen, as he had a central line put in, so he could have chemo and bloods taken easily. We were wrong… it was just the start.
After that we got the results which confirmed neuroblastoma. He started chemotherapy immediately.
It was awful, he was in pain but we were desperate for it to start as the tumour was growing by the day.
But just days later he was back in intensive care having fluid drained from his lungs. But, two rounds of chemo later, the tumour started shrinking.
He had a tube put in to feed him and his weight went up.
Further scans showed the neuroblastoma had spread to his skull, bone marrow and the fluid in his lungs.
In total he had eight rounds of chemo, surgery to slice out the tumour, high dose chemo with stem cell transplant, 14 rounds of radiotherapy and five cycles of immunotherapy.
The NHS offered the immunotherapy but we raised money through family, friends and strangers to have it at a private, specialist centre in Barcelona, Spain, as they were offering a breakthrough drug which seemed to be getting good results.
Throughout it all he was up and down. He was, really poorly during the high dose chemo and so miserable. He was in an enormous about of pain. But other times he was happy and his usual fun self.
He is so thoughtful. We’re obviously both very stressed and he recognises that.
He turned to his dad the other day and said: “It’s ok daddy everything is going to be ok.”
We recently learnt that he currently has no evidence of disease. It’s amazing news and we are so pleased. But, sadly, he stands a 40 percent chance of a relapse.
There’s a clinical trial in New York, not available in the UK, where children can receive a series of injections over a year which prevents the cancer relapsing.
However, that – and the immunotherapy – costs in the region of £400,000 of which we have raised around £325,000.
I know it is a lot of money but we will do whatever it takes to get our darling boy better.
Emma has launched a social media campaign #TEN4TED where you can text to donate TEDM55 and your amount (£1-£10) to 70070
Or donate to Teddy's page at at .
What is neuroblastoma?
Neuroblastoma is a type of cancer that develops in nerve cells that have been left behind from their development in the womb.
It usually develops in the adrenal glands next to the kidneys but can also form in the spinal cord, neck, chest, pelvis or abdomen and is able to spread to other organs.
It is unknown what causes the cancer but it affects around 100 children in the UK every year with many of them under five.
The outlook for children diagnosed with the condition varies and mainly depends on if the cancer has spread.
he early signs and symptoms of neuroblastoma can be very hard to spot, especially in young babies as they can be mistaken for other common conditions.
However, according to NHS Choices, signs and symptoms of neuroblastoma include:
- A swollen painful tummy
- Constipation
- Breathlessness
- Difficult swallowing
- A lump in the neck
- Blue lumps on the skin and bruising
- Fatigue, weakness and bone pain
- Jerky eye and muscle movements
There are five main treatments for neuroblastoma and doctors will decide which course of action to take based upon how advanced the disease is.
One option is surgery to remove the cancer and another is chemotherapy to try and kill the cancer cells.
Other treatments include radiotherapy, a stem cell transplant and immunotherapy.
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