Josie gives us all such inspiration

Dec 15 2006 By Chloe Griffiths, The Journal

Brave, vivacious teenager Josie Grove touched the hearts of all our readers with her decision to forgo any further cancer treatment.

The 16-year-old's choice to embrace her remaining time with her family rather than carry on with hospital treatment, moved the nation - and moved one of our columnists to tears.

Inspired by Josie's story and provided with the motivation by his wife Gemma, former leukaemia sufferer David Banks has pledged to use his second chance to shift the pounds in honour of the courageous youngster.

So today, The Journal launches an appeal to raise funds for The Josie Grove Leukaemia Fund.

The registered charity was set up by the youngster, who is a talented artist and champion swimmer, to collect cash to improve the lives of other children suffering from cancer and to fund research.

And now we are urging all of our readers to play their part in raising funds in aid of the talented youngster.

Josie, a student at the Queen Elizabeth High School in Hexham, said yesterday: "I think it's absolutely brilliant.

"It really helps give my life a purpose. I don't know how long I have, but it feels really worthwhile.

"I just want to get on with my life and enjoy spending time with my family and helping in any way I can."

Readers who have also been affected by Josie's tale can support David in his bid to lose six stone by pledging to donate money to his sponsored slim.

Those who have been motivated by Josie's bravery to make better use of their own lives should contact The Journal with their own fundraising ideas.

We want all our readers to get active in aid of Josie - with anything from a sponsored swim to a football game or sky-dive ... or even a sponsored slim like David Banks.

Josie's dad Cliff, a jewellery designer, last night welcomed The Journal's campaign.

He said: "It's absolutely fantastic.

"The pictures in The Journal were just lovely and we really liked the story. It showed how full of life Josie is.

"It's all been a bit overwhelming since then, but anything that raises funds for her charity is just great."

Columnist David was further motivated to go ahead with his fundraising effort after a second hard-hitting Journal story - just days after we featured Josie collecting a Brave Hearts Award at St James's Park.

The 58-year-old was compelled to act after reading a story warning of an "obesity timebomb" in the North-East.

"Shamed" by Josie's courage, David - who has been given the all clear after being diagnosed with chronic lymphocytic leukaemia 10 years ago - has vowed to grab his second chance with both hands.

Now we want all our readers to follow David's example and make better use of their lives in her name.

Josie was diagnosed with leukaemia two years ago and has since had two bone marrow transplants - including one from her baby brother Charlie - and a course of aggressive anti-cancer drugs, but it has all proved fruitless.

Doctors have now told her the cancer is terminal.

But Josie, who lives with her parents Cliff, 46, and Jacqui, 44, both jewellery designers, and her three siblings, Freddie, 13, Libby, 11, and Charlie, eight months, has now declined all further treatment - because she wants to enjoy the rest of her life without going to hospital.

Brian Aitken, editor of The Journal, said: "Josie's bravery touched us all and we are so pleased to be involved in this fundraising effort.

"Many readers have told us how inspired they were by Josie's tremendous courage and our columnist David Banks's decision to slim for Josie gives him an opportunity to do just that. I hope that our readers support him and join in with their own fundraising schemes too."

• Anyone wishing to donate direct to the Josie Grove Leukaemia Foundation can do so by visiting www.charitygiving.co.uk  or sending cheques - made payable to The Dove Trust, with Josie Grove Leukaemia Fund written on the back - to PO Box 92, Dereham NR20 4W.

• The Josie Grove Leukaemia Fund goes under the umbrella of The Dove Trust, registered charity 287401.D.

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I wept in admiration, and maybe in shame
By David Banks

I wept when I read about 16-year-old Josie Grove in The Journal last week. Tears of admiration, certainly. And maybe tears of shame, too.

You will, I am certain, recall Josie's story: a bright, beautiful and talented teenager with apparently terminal leukaemia who, after two failed bone marrow transplants and two years of aggressive chemotherapy, has decided to forgo further treatment.

Why? Because she wants to get on with the business of living. To spend what time remains enjoying life in the company of her loving and understanding family, uninterrupted by daily hospital visits for lengthy intravenous transfusions of debilitating and possibly pointless drugs.

I know a little of the agony behind young Josie's heartrending decision; 10 years ago I, too, was diagnosed with leukaemia. Like Josie, I cheerfully endured years of treatment with increasingly strong - and harsh - drugs which make up the chemotherapy cocktail which for so many people keeps cancer in check.

My cancer was chronic lymphocytic leukaemia, not as terrifying as Josie's but still aggressive enough to resist all treatments. My hair fell out, I felt nauseous and exhausted. There were months when the drugs which were killing my cancerous cells were also destroying healthy, oxygen-carrying red blood cells as well, leaving me so weak I could not climb the kerb.

And like Josie, I underwent the misery of a failed transplant. The wonderful staff at the London Clinic removed my diseased stem cells, tried to clean them up, then reinstated my "laundered" immune system.

It failed. So did an attempt to find a suitable matching donor through the Anthony Nolan Fund's database. Time was running out, my immune system failed to cope.

Bacterial meningitis came close to killing me and would have done so had it not been for the skill of doctors and nurses at the Borders General Hospital in Melrose. I was beginning to despair ... and then, a miracle! Just as Josie found that her new-born brother Charlie was a perfect match and could donate his stem cells, so too was my brother, Richard. He gave me his immune system and I and my medical team waited. And prayed.

That was four years ago. I have not taken drugs since. At a six-monthly check-up last week, my immune system was pronounced "robust".

"You will," intoned my consultant, gravely eyeing my obese frame, "undoubtedly one day die from something other than leukaemia."

Coincidentally, that very day a report in The Journal showed the North-East trailing badly in national fitness comparisons. It reminded me painfully that cancer and obesity are this nation's greatest killers. And that I might have avoided one only to risk falling prey to the other.

That is when I thought again of Josie Grove and her courage. And why I wept those tears of shame. Her transplants failed, she has so far gained no happy ending.

Josie is 16 with all the world to live for. I am 58, with such a lifetime of family joy, travel and career success behind me that when I thought my time was up, I begged my children not to weep for me: "There is no need," I told them.

So I make this pledge: I will pray for a miracle for Josie, for her to be granted the second chance that I was given. And in her name I will try to make better use of my new life: lose weight and get fit, repay the love and patience my wife and family and friends showed in me and raise money for the Josie Grove Fund.

Please support me, sponsor me. Better still, join me and get your own family and friends to sponsor you. Ten or 20p per pound lost would make you and me - and our overweight children - fitter and happier as well as bringing in a useful sum over a month which the fund could donate to a children's leukaemia charity. Josie Grove is my inspiration. I will not let her down.

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Let's work together to build this dream

The Journal is urging the whole of the North-East to get behind our bid to raise money for Josie's fund.

There are two ways you can do your bit to help:

* Anyone wishing to sponsor David Banks in his bid to shed the pounds in aid of the Josie Grove Leukaemia Fund should fill in the form included and return it to The Journal, saying how much money you are pledging.

OR:

* Let us know what fitness-related fundraising method you have come up with yourself to raise cash for The Josie Grove Leukaemia Fund.

We are urging our readers to come up with fund-raising ideas - it could be a sponsored swim, or a sponsored football match or even a sponsored bungee jump.

Please contact The Journal newsdesk with information on any events - solo or team - you have arranged to help the boost the fund.

Anyone wishing to get involved should contact The Journal newsdesk on (0191) 201-6344 or email jnl.newdesk@ncjmedia.co.uk

You may send cheques payable to The Dove Trust (registered charity 287401) - Josie Groves Leukaemia Fund written on the back - to The Journal, PO Box 1146, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE99 1ET.