Dear Millie

Marco Previero

Description

"Dear Millie, I am writing you this letter in the hope that life has afforded you the opportunity to grow old enough to read it..." So starts the most extraordinary diary about a seven-year-old girl and her family, violently thrown into the most dreaded abyss when they discover she has cancer in the form of a malignant brain tumour. On the morning of 5th April 2013, Millie wakes up complaining of 'fuzziness' in her eyes. This very quickly turns to loss of vision. Within the next two days Millie will undergo her first eight-hour craniotomy (brain operation) to preserve the little eyesight she has left. Within four days, by now blind, she will be diagnosed with cancer, and within a fortnight she will begin her first cycle of aggressive chemotherapy. Over the course of the six months that follow, Millie will undertake two further brain operations, three additional cycles of chemotherapy and thirty sessions of radiotherapy - 4,000 miles away from home. This diary is her story, the intimate tale of her illness in three parts (Hell, Purgatory and Heaven). It is recounted by her father as his gift to Millie, so that she can read it at an age when she will be old enough to understand the enormity of the immeasurable suffering she had to endure, and the extraordinary courage with which she did it. Dear Millie is not just based on a true story - it is a true story. It is an extraordinary tale of suffering, destruction, resilience and, ultimately, rebirth. In support of Great Ormond Street Hospital, Marco Previero has pledged to donate all royalties to this charity in order to contribute to the ongoing effort to help other children, now and in the future, in fighting this most deadly of afflictions and its devastating consequences.

Sujets

• Médecine
• Oncology
• Diaries

Informations

• Publié par: Troubador Publishing Ltd
• Date de parution: 06 avril 2017
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781784629267
• Langue: English

Extrait

MARCO PREVIERO was born in Montpellier, France, in 1972. He moved to the UK in 1988 to finish his schooling – and stayed. Having long accepted without too much remorse the gentle pleasures of an uneventful and ordinary life, he was woefully unprepared to guide and support his seven-year-old daughter through the vicious agony of cancer treatment when she was diagnosed with a malignant brain tumour in April 2013. He has been trying his best to be a good father ever since.

Copyright © 2015 Marco Previero
The moral right of the author has been asserted.
Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of research or private study, or criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, this publication may only be reproduced, stored or transmitted, in any form or by any means, with the prior permission in writing of the publishers, or in the case of reprographic reproduction in accordance with the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside those terms should be sent to the publishers.
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To Millie, who has, despite her young age, guided me throughout this ordeal, and inspired me to keep going when hope was a currency I could not afford to use.
To Mr J – Millie’s neurosurgeon – whose judgment, decision-making and skills were the single most instrumental and contributory factors in saving Millie’s eyesight and, on the balance of probabilities, her life.
To the student nurses, nurses and senior nurses of Koala Ward (Great Ormond Street Hospital). In our darkest hours, you made all the difference.
Dear Millie is a true, factual narrative account of my daughter’s cancer treatment. As such, some names and identifying details have been changed to protect the privacy of those individuals who have asked to remain anonymous.

Chapter headings are extracts from Henry F. Carey’s translation of The Divine Comedy (Harvard Classics, Vol 20 – PF Collier & Son Company 1909–14).
CONTENTS
Introduction
I – Inferno ( Hell )
All hope abandon, ye who enter here
1) Day 1 – 7:12am, Friday 5 th April 2013
2) Day 1 – 7:15am, Friday 5 th April 2013
3) Day 1 – 7:18am, Friday 5 th April 2013
Into the dread abyss
4) Day 1 – 7:40am, Friday 5 th April 2013
5) Day 1 – 8:40am, Friday 5 th April 2013
6) Day 1 – 12:35pm, Friday 5 th April 2013
In the grass, the serpent trains
7) Day 1 – 12:36pm, Friday 5 th April 2013
8) Day 1 – 2:15pm, Friday 5 th April 2013
9) Day 1 – 8:15pm, Friday 5 th April 2013
Between the walls and the tormented souls
10) Day 2 – 6:23am, Saturday 6 th April 2013
11) Day 2 – 9:12am, Saturday 6 th April 2013
12) Day 2 – 11:32am, Saturday 6 th April 2013
A forest, where no track of steps had worn a way
13) Day 2 – 3:17pm, Saturday 6 th April 2013
14) Day 2 – 6:17pm, Saturday 6 th April 2013
15) Day 2 – 7:20pm, Saturday 6 th April 2013
Through the gross and murky air, a shape comes swimming up
16) Day 3 – 8:45am, Sunday 7 th April 2013
17) Day 3 – 10:30am, Sunday 7 th April 2013
18) Day 3 – 3:27pm Sunday 7 th April 2013
Thence to my view another vale appeared
19) Day 3 – 4:46pm, Sunday 7 th April 2013
20) Day 4 – 1:15am, Monday 8 th April 2013
21) Day 4 – 5:11am, Monday 8 th April 2013
There in the depth we saw a painted tribe
22) Day 5 – 9:49am, Tuesday 9 th April 2013
23) Day 5 – 1:09pm, Tuesday 9 th April 2013
24) Day 5 – 4:59pm, Tuesday 9 th April 2013
For as time wears me, I shall grieve the more
25) Day 6 – 11:32am, Wednesday 10 th April
26) Day 6 – 1:59pm, Wednesday 10 th April
27) Day 6 – 5:41pm, Wednesday 10 th April
So were mine eyes inebriate that they longed to stay and weep
28) Day 7 – Thursday 11 th April
29) Day 8 – Friday 12 th April: am
30) Day 8 – Friday 12 th April: pm
Turning our back upon the vale of woe
31) Day 9 – Saturday 13 th April
32) Day 10 – Sunday 14 th April
33) Day 11 – Monday 15 th April
The way is long, and much uncouth the road
34) Epilogue to Inferno
II – Purgatorio ( Purgatory )
That hue which the dun shades of Hell concealed
1) Day 12 – 10:15am, Tuesday 16 th April
2) Day 12 – 11:30am, Tuesday 16 th April
3) Day 12 – 1:45pm, Tuesday 16 th April
We through the broken rock ascended
4) Day 12 – 4pm, Tuesday 16 th April
5) Day 12 – 4:30pm, Tuesday 16 th April
6) Day 12 – 6pm, Tuesday 16 th April
Now was the hour that wakens fond desire
7) Day 13 – Wednesday 17 th April
8) Day 14 – Thursday 18 th April
9) Day 15 – Friday 19 th April
When we had passed the threshold of the gate
10) Day 16 – Saturday 20 th April
11) Day 21 – Thursday 25 th April
12) Day 22 – Friday 26 th April
Oh pleasant light, my confidence and hope!
13) Day 23 – Saturday 27 th April
14) Day 24 – Sunday 28 th April
15) Day 29 – Friday 3 rd May
Other good there is, where man finds not his happiness
16) Day 33 – Tuesday 7 th May
17) Day 37 – Saturday 11 th May
18) Day 39 – Monday 13 th May
So on I fared, in thoughtfulness and dread
19) Day 61 – Tuesday 4 th June
20) Day 62 – Wednesday 5 th June
21) Day 69 – Wednesday 12 th June
The odour which inflames us with desire to feed and drink
22) Day 78 – Friday 21 st June
23) Day 81 – Monday 24 th June
24) Day 90 – Wednesday 3 rd July
A little glimpse of sky was seen above
25) Day 104 – Wednesday 17 th July
26) Day 105 – Thursday 18 th July
27) Day 119 – Thursday 1 st August
Feel the edge of other sword; and thou shalt weep for that
28) Day 127 – Friday 9 th August
29) Day 133 – Thursday 15 th August
30) Day 138 – Tuesday 20 th August
Pure and made apt for mounting to the stars
31) Day 145 – Tuesday 27 th August
32) Day 148 – Friday 30 th August
33) Epilogue to Purgatorio
III – Paradiso ( Heaven )
So said, she turned toward the Heaven her face
1) Day 151 – Monday 2 nd September
2) Day 153 – Wednesday 4 th September
3) Day 157 – Sunday 8 th September: am
So drew full more than thousand splendours toward us
4) Day 157 – Sunday 8 th September
5) Day 157 – Sunday 8 th September
6) Day 157 – Sunday 8 th September
Let the destined years come round
7) Day 159 – Tuesday 10 th September: am
8) Day 159 – Tuesday 10 th September: pm
9) Day 160 – Wednesday 11 th September
O fond anxiety of mortal men
10) Day 161 – Thursday 12 th September
11) Day 163 – Saturday 14 th September
12) Day 166 – Tuesday 17 th September
With lively ray serene overcome the massiest air
13) Day 169 – Friday 20 th September
14) Day 172 – Monday 23 rd September
15) Day 176 – Friday 27 th September
Like a golden mirror in the sun
16) Day 180 – Tuesday 1 st October
17) Day 182 – Thursday 3 rd October
18) Day 183 – Friday 4 th October
Esteem such scantiness of knowledge our delight
19) Day 184 – Saturday 5 th October
20) Day 188 – Wednesday 9 th October
21) Day 189 – Thursday 10 th October
To the beauteous eyes, mine eyes returned
22) Day 190 – Friday 11 th October
23) Day 194 – Tuesday 15 th October
24) Day 195 – Wednesday 16 th October
And such eclipse in Heaven, methinks, was seen
25) Day 197 – Friday 18 th October
26) Day 199 – Sunday 20 th October
27) Day 201 – Tuesday 22 nd October
The shadowy cone almost to level on our earth declines
28) Day 203 – Thursday 24 th October
29) Day 205 – Saturday 26 th October
30) Day 207 – Monday 28 th October
The love that moves the sun and all the stars
31) Day 211 – Friday 1 st November
32) Day 212 – Saturday 2 nd November
33) Epilogue to Heaven
INTRODUCTION
Dear Millie,
I am writing you this letter in the hope that life has afforded you the opportunity to grow old enough to read it. Shortly after your seventh birthday you were diagnosed with a secreting germ cell tumour, a rare and malignant cancer of the brain, which initially manifested itself when you complained of ‘fuzziness’ in your beautiful brown eyes on the morning of 5 th April 2013. The fuzziness, I quickly established, turned out to be loss of vision in your right eye and near-blindness in your left one.
Within the next two days you had undergone your first eight-hour craniotomy (brain operation) to preserve the little vision you had left. Within four days, by now blind, you were diagnosed with cancer, and within a fortnight you had begun your first cycle of aggressive chemotherapy. Over the course of the six months that followed, you would undertake two further brain operations, three additional cycles of chemotherapy and thirty sessions of radiotherapy 4,000 miles away from home.
The events that unfolded during that year were the most traumatic, upsetting and painful events in your life, in my life, in your mother’s life and in pretty much all of our family’s lives combined. To keep my sanity, I started writing what was happening to us as a family, and what was happening to you as my daughter. In doing so, I wanted to preserve the detail, so easily forgotten, of what you had to go through, and the courage with which you did it, so that you could read your story at an age when you would understand how extraordinary you had been during that time.
If you are reading this letter and diary now, then you have lived to tell the tale: a tale of courage, of fortitude, of resilience, of pain, of destruction, and, ultimately, of rebirth.
When hope was a currency I could not afford to use, in places sunlight could not reach, you rescued me out of the dark hell that is cancer when it creeps slowly, unstoppable, towards a loved one; and one so young. And so I felt it was fitting that I