Help support Laurence through his cancer journey

Laurence is an aspiring police officer, jujitsu, gym and guitar loving 27 year old with a loving family, fiancé and a 7 year old daughter. He was healthy, fit and an extremely hard worker who did everything he could to provide for his family.

Tragically, earlier this year after experiencing a headache for a few weeks , Laurence collapsed at home one night on the 7th of May 2023. Laurence was taken by ambulance to Sunshine Hospital. After a myriad of tests and procedures he was found to have a 1 litre sack of fluid surrounding his heart and was taken for emergency heart surgery to drain the fluid. During these tests, they also found multiple tumours throughout Laurence’s body, and he was admitted to the Peter MacCallum cancer centre on 20th of May for further testing. It was here that he was diagnosed with Primary mediasteinal germ cell tumours, with metastasis in his lungs, chest wall, liver, spleen and bones. He had a week of radiation when he was first admitted to target a 10cm tumour in his left lung, as it was causing difficulty breathing and he was bleeding into his chest.

He was later also diagnosed with malignant haemophagocytic lymphohystiocytosis (HLH), after 2 bone marrow biopsies.

Laurence spent just over 3 months at Peter Mac undergoing approximately 50 transfusions of blood and platelets. Maybe more we really don’t know.

He also went through 4 rounds of chemo. Every round went for 5 days/10 hours a day , at a total of 60 bags of chemo. He has multiple blood clots through out his body including a pulmonary embolism.

He was released from Peter Mac on the 15th of August and spent 4 weeks at home. He was readmitted to Peter Mac on the 12th of September due to some severe back pain.

More scans, tests and a bone biopsy has shown that the HLH is now causing tumours and inflammation to show up in other areas of his body. The first being his spine, which is what was causing the pain that sent him to hospital.

Most recently, on the 6th of October, Laurence started noticing some problems with his vision. He was taken for an urgent CT scan and MRI, and they have now found number of these small tumours in his brain.

Unfortunately, the new diagnosis made the original plan of any more chemo therapy, or a bone marrow transplant no longer viable treatment options.

Laurence has now undergone more intensive radiotherapy sessions on both his back, and brain and has now started a new drug, not made or sold in Australia, that has been sourced from overseas that will help to prolong his life.

This has been, and continues to be a long and incredibly tough journey for Laurence and our family, but we know that if anyone can beat this it’s him. He’s our warrior, and we’re not giving up without a fight.

We are hoping to raise some money to help support him and his family through the financial hardship the last 6 months has caused. We as a family would like him to be able to live the remainder of his life to the fullest, stress free.

We really appreciate all the love and support everyone has shown us during this time. We are forever grateful.