The mother of a young Duncan girl who died on July 28 from an aggressive form of cancer wants to thank the community and friends for all their support during a troubled time.
Julie Fletcher is the mother of the late six-year-old Haven, who died in Canuck Place Children’s Hospital in Vancouver from midline glioma, a high-grade malignant pediatric brain tumour with a near-zero survival rate.
Fletcher said Haven died just about five weeks after she was diagnosed in June, and was medicated and felt no pain in her final moments surrounded by family.
A GoFundMe page had been set up and approximately $11,000 was raised in the community to help pay for expenses related to Haven’s medical condition, including flying back and forth to BC Children’s Hospital in Vancouver for her treatments.
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“It was definitely enough for us to work with and I want to thank everyone for all their help,” Fletcher said.
“I’m not back to work yet as my doctor wanted me to take some time off, but I hope to heal from Haven’s passing over time. I also have two other daughters, aged 13 and 16, and we’re all helping each other get through this.”
Haven was airlifted to BC Children’s Hospital in Vancouver on June 20 and, after many tests, the doctors made the diagnosis the next day.
The typical survival time for people with this type of aggressive cancer remains less than a year.
Fletcher said the similarities between her older brother Anthony, who died at the age of five in 1974 in an accident, and Haven seem to be beyond coincidence.
She said they were both similar in age when they died, they both died during the month of July and Anthony was buried in Mountain View Cemetery in Surrey while Haven was burned in Mountain View cemetery in Duncan.
“I often wonder if Haven was really my brother,” Fletcher said.
“I was young when Anthony died so I didn’t have a chance to get to know him, but I’ve always imagined we would have been peas in a pod, like Haven and I were, if he had not died.”