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Tony and I met when we were both very young. We were childhood sweethearts and had known each other a long time before building a life together with our three children. But sadly we lost Tony two years ago, after a short battle with cancer.
When he was diagnosed, the doctors gave Tony only a year to live, but we were blessed with more than 18 months together. During all the treatments and surgeries, he came out of it so positively and was always so strong. I have heard similar stories from friends I have made through Karuna. They all say how strong their partner or husband or wife was and how they carried everyone else through the illness with their positive attitude.
But about 17 months down the track, we decided not to continue treatment. The doctors had told us that they needed to control the growth of the tumor. This meant having surgery every four months. We knew this would be more than Tony could cope with. This was an agonizing decision for us because we knew that he would not survive without further surgery. It was at this point that we agreed to sell our business. That was another hard decision because once Tony let go of the business, he knew he would have to let go of us and that would be it.
Tony always said he didn’t fear death, but he felt very concerned about how I would cope and how that would affect the children. So I knew it was my turn to be strong. When he was discharged from the hospital we were told we would need more support and that is when our relationship with Karuna began.
