Hi! My name is Celia. I am 12-years-old now. I live in England. From looking at me I look like a healthy 12-year-old who still rides and has her own pony and a Bichon Frise called Pippa, but there is more to it than that. From a very young age I have had to have my eyes checked regularly, so when I was 9 and they were going to discharge me, my eyesight had gotten worse. Other symptoms were headaches and I started developing puberty early. I was told I needed an MRI scan. When the results came through, it showed I had a brain tumour*. Within a few weeks I had an operation to see exactly what the tumour was. My surgeon removed a little bit of it, but not all of it. Because my tumour was very close to my optic nerves he couldn't remove too much of it. The tumour they found was called a pilocytic astrocytoma of the hypothalamus and optic chiasm.

I then had 15 months of chemotherapy, where I lost my hair and I felt very weak and sick. I went to school for some days, but if so, only for half a day. My friends and family were very supportive at this hard time. After recovering from this difficult time, I started going back to school for longer and I was getting stronger.

A few months from finishing the treatment, I got the headaches again. I had another scan and the tumour had grown. So I had another operation and the results from this were positive and the majority of it was removed. This was done in December, 2002 and now I am on lots of medicines, which are to replace hormones that I can no longer produce myself. I still have constant headaches, but some are due to the medicines I am on. I now have regular MRI scans.

I just want to say to all young people who have brain tumours that you should never give up and always look forward to the good times.

*Did you know that ětumourî is how brain tumor is spelled in England?