Paula Radcliffe’s daughter, 18, running London Marathon as she lifts lid on ultra-rare cancer diagnosis
PAULA RADCLIFFE’S daughter is running the London Marathon after recovering from an ultra-rare cancer.
Isla, 18, will take on the 26.2mile challenge on Sunday in what will be her first marathon.
Isla was diagnosed with a rare form of ovarian cancer five years ago when she was just 13.
She has now recovered, and her mother, Radcliffe, opened up about the diagnosis.
She told the Radio Times: “That’s when we knew something wasn’t right, and we went to the paediatrician.
“It then moved very quickly.
“On the Tuesday she visited the doctor, we had a scan on the Wednesday and one week later we were already in the hospital starting the first round of chemo.
“It’s the hardest thing a parent can go through.
“You can support them and be with them the whole way through, but you can’t do that chemo for them.
“It’s horrible to watch your child suffering through that, but at the same time we believed that if it felt bad, it was killing the cancer.”
Radcliffe, 51, is back running marathons and offers advice to runners of all levels.
Her Paula’s Maratah Run Club podcast is sponsored by Children with Cancer UK.
What are the signs of ovarian cancer?
Ovarian cancers affects the ovaries – the organs that store the eggs needed to make babies.
It mostly affects women over the age of 50 and can sometimes run in families, according to the NHS.
Symptoms of the cancer can be vague, particularly in its early stages, Cancer Research UK SAYS.
The charity advises you speak to a GP if you have the following symptoms:
- Feeling full quickly
- Loss of appetite
- Pain in your abdomen or lower part of your abdomen that doesn’t go away
- Bloating or an increase in the size of your abdomen
- Needing to wee more often
- Tiredness that is unexplained
- Weight loss that is unexplained
- Changes in your bowel habit or symptoms of irritable bowel syndrome, especially if this starts after the age of 50
The NHS added that bleeding from the vagina after the menopause could be another possible symptom of ovarian cancer.
That is the charity that Isla is raising money and awareness for when she runs across the nation’s capital city.
Radcliffe, who was world marathon champion in 2005 and won London three times, retired from professional racing in April 2015.
She also revealed that she asked her gynaecologist if she could freeze her own eggs if Isla was left infertile from her cancer.
She added: “He just looked at me and said, ‘Look, she isn’t going to want your 47-year-old eggs’.
“When she lost her hair, I said I would cut my hair off and get it made into a wig for her. She flat-out refused that.
“We’d not told many people at the time, and she didn’t want people asking why I’d done it.
“There are things you’re not ready for – either going through it or as a parent.
“She doesn’t know how it has affected her chances of becoming a parent.
“She now has a tendency under stress to get allergic reactions on her skin, and we don’t know whether that’s linked to the treatment.”
Radcliffe also has a son Raphael, 14, with husband Gary Lough.
She has insisted that he has a promising career as a runner himself, as he is showing plenty of talent.
And the Team GB icon also praised the teenager for how he was with Isla during her cancer battle.
She said: “There was a huge amount of mother’s guilt for the fact that you have to focus more on one child for that period of time.
“He’s (Raphael) extremely empathetic, probably in a way that most 14-year-old boys are not, right now.
“I hope he doesn’t lose that because it’s really special.
“He’d even let Isla sit and curl his hair when she had no hair to curl, the only proviso being that he would brush it before he went out anywhere.
“He spent a lot of time with her and worrying about her, and they have a closer bond because of that.”