Jakub’s story

“I saw how Jakub had changed, he was not my son anymore, I didn’t recognise the same person he was four or five months ago – something was going on with my son. 

“I knew something was going on because he changed in a very short time, he was like half a Jakub – he’d lost a lot of weight, his skin was like paper, he was white, his lips were grey – when he was back from school he would eat some dinner and then after this he’d go to bed and take a nap for an hour and when he woke up there was no change.” 

Mum, Jolanta, said: “As a mother my heart broke, and the world seemed so unfair because my child got cancer. The emotions we experienced at that time were so incredibly difficult. I wanted so badly to take that cancer away from my son. 

“I think he was still in shock and asked me ‘mum, why me?’ – that day, when we found out our son had cancer, it changed everything, time stood still – when he said ‘your son has cancer’ it was like I’d been stunned, I felt paralysed – that diagnosis it reorganised our daily lives” 

Jakub started treatment at Sheffield Children’s Hospital, where he spent a lot of time away from home, his friends and his twin sister Julia. His mum and dad, Adrian, had to divide their time between being at hospital with Jakub and at home with his sister who was still going to school.

“Jakub’s diagnosis changed everything, reorganised our daily lives, caused huge stress. We had disbelief, helplessness and fear for our son’s life.” 

His parents were also having to travel back and forth from the hospital, which meant they faced many extra costs such as fuel and parking. 

“We’re 22 miles one way [from the hospital] so we drove every day, sometimes several times a day – sometimes he was vomitting or had a temperature so we were back to hospital – we had fuel and parking – we paid a fortune for parking for the first three weeks when we were in hospital every single day we were there for most of the day when he had surgeries and biopsies so the minimum cost was £17 a day.” 

His parents were unable to work so they faced a decline in their income, at a time when they had extra costs to pay out like travel as well as new clothes for Jakub and food while in hospital. 

“The first three weeks we used our holiday [leave] so for the first three weeks we were receiving normal money but after this we applied for universal credit and it was the first time in my life I applied for UC – after this we used 28 weeks SSP and that’s it. You can’t exist with money like that especially when you’re working all your life – we used all of our savings and after two months when we’d used the savings and our holiday leave our pockets were absolutely empty.” 

Jakub being in hospital also had a huge impact on his twin sister’s life too. 

“That was a big challenge for me, trying to explain to her why we must stay in hospital, why Jakub is sick – I didn’t know the answer to ‘why’ but i explained to her we must do everything to help Jakub. She was supported at school so if she felt sad she could use the special room at school she could sit and think or cry if she needed to.” 

Throughout Jakub’s treatment, he and his family were supported by Emily, a Young Lives vs Cancer specialist social worker. 

“when we went to clinic on 9 March, we met Emily Taylor and I think Emily was the first person my son trusted. 

“she was there for us from the start when we started our journey with Jakub – Emily is an incredible social worker, she has been there to listen to our every fear and emotion, especially me I had amazing emotional support from her side, but we had support for the whole family” 

 She supported Jakub’s family emotionally and financially too, to help them with the extra costs they faced. 

“I remember when we went to clinic for the first time, she told me ‘you drove from Barnsley so we give you some petrol grant’ next day I was given £100 for the petrol, that £100 was the next four or five days drive to Sheffield so that was a big support as well. I remember how she helped us fill in the DLA application form as well – that was a huge challenge for us and without her help i think it wouldn’t work. 

“We received Christmas money because on 8 December i lost my job so my employer told me ‘we don’t want to keep you anymore because we don’t know when you’re back’ so they sack me two weeks before holiday so when she found out she tried to get some christmas money for our family so I could spend money for Jakub and Julia to buy presents for them.” 

Jakub and his family have been fundraising for Young Lives vs Cancer in their local community and are passionate about raising awareness of the experiences young people with cancer face.