Supporting Seb - fighting B Cell Lymphoma

This is Seb Alweyn and Dudley, his Dad.

While his mates were having fun playing basketball and doing all the teenage things, Seb faced one of the hardest things a teenager of 15 years could face watching his Dad battle cancer and then saying goodbye.

Duds, as I affectionately called him was a beautiful soul and fought a hard fight; unfortunately he took a turn for the worst and passed away on April 7th, 2020 with his family around him at home. Being challenged with covid and the restrictions with lockdowns, the Alweyn family didn't get to say goodbye in a way that was deserving for Duds. With two attempts to have a celebration of Dud's life, it has been hard to start healing with extra lock downs, determined we will get there at some stage when we can.

Fast forward 15 months, Seb began to experience a swelling and pressure in the knee area, which the moved above the knee and the pain came and went. Xrays and ultrasounds came back clear. Then chronic pain in his leg resulting in the Alweyn's returning to hospital to seek answers.

The results have been shattering for Seb, Dianna his mum and the family. Seb has an aggressive tumour 25cm long extending from his femur to the top of his tibia, looking like it includes surrounding soft tissue and the lymph nodes in the area are swollen.

The best confirmation that they have so far is that it is an aggressive cancer which is malignant.

There have been cryptic things over the last month such as being asked has he started chemo yet, being measured for wheelchairs, discussions about prosthetics or the doctors having discussions about placing the biopsy in specific places so it wont interfere with future surgery.

If I was a 16 year old hearing this news I would be a mess.. but not Sebbo. Saying to his mum Dianna, "It is what it is - nothing we haven't already been through with Dad". Seb is taking each day of uncertainty in his stride and remains positive to the core. One thing is for sure that he has a massive fight on his hands. All that he hopes for when all is said and done and he's on the other side of this cancer uncertainty, is that he can play basketball with his mates which he loves; even if its with a prosthetic leg.

Flash forward to today, a month in; Seb, Dianna and family are still waiting on clarity of the sort of Cancer they are fighting. At the moment the suspects are things like Ewings Sarcoma, Leukaemia or Lymphoma (if its Lymphoma it likely that the 25cm tumour in his bone is secondary cancer, but …we still dont know). The biopsy that was undertaken needs to be redone because Seb is in 1/30 that get a bad reading first go. This now means a biopsy in three places to cover every possible chance of it not working again. .. and now we wait...

Dianna who was the sole income earner for the family had only started returning back to work around August 2020 on minimum hours while adjusting to life without Duds. This has been hard to do understandably and she had not made it back to work and normal income since to support the family.

The day the local doctor told Dianna that Sebbo had cancer, was the day that Dianna submitted her notice to her daycare families; this is where I come in. Dianna and the Alweyn's have been a part of my family since my children were born. They have become part of our family. I have watched Seb and his sister Sarah grow as they have watched my kids grow and we have been there for each other through some challenging times.

As soon as I heard the unthinkable and after I asking myself how much can one family go through, I turned my energy towards “what can I do?”... “what can any of us do?”

I have started this go fund me page to support Seb, his mum Dianna and the family to take the pressure of the everyday expenses away from them (as well as the unknowns!). If you are in a position to donate towards supporting a beautiful kid and his family, please click on the link and remember to click the button to add the admin fees for go fund me as well if you can.

We don't have all the answers yet, and its likely we will still have a couple of weeks waiting for that; but there are still a couple of weeks with no income for Dianna, running back and forward from appointments with bills rolling in, not to mention the medical expenses that will come for Sebo once we have some clear answers.

I am setting up a private facebook page to support Seb and Dianna titled "Support for Seb", where we will post updates and if needed call on help from our community.

Thank you all for the support x We will add updates as we know more.