Jo’s story

‘I just needed to speak about it for it to make sense, for me to be able to deal with it in my own head.’

Jo Johnson from New Mills was diagnosed with ovarian cancer in 2022, and for Jo this came at a time when she already had a huge amount to deal with. ‘On top of the ovarian cancer diagnosis I had a lot going on in my life. My dad was poorly, my mum had started with Alzheimer’s, my sister had cancer and my husband had ulcerative Colitis’

To further add to Jo’s worries, she had discovered she had the BRCA gene variant, and was anxiously waiting on test results to see if her daughter also had the gene variant, (Predictive genetic tests for cancer risk genes – NHS (www.nhs.uk) which greatly increases the risk of ovarian and breast cancer.

As part of her treatment Jo, aged 57, underwent a full hysterectomy and had a stoma fitted at The Christie. She explained: ‘It was awful, I had such a lot on my plate and felt I needed some help – just to talk to someone about it all.

‘After my surgery The Christie put me in touch with Blythe House Hospice as one thing I needed was counselling to support me with everything that was going on.

‘I then got a phone call from Karen at Blythe House Hospice where she sat down with me and discussed everything that was offer for me at the hospice.’

Jo was able to access counselling, acupuncture, and physiotherapy services from the hospice to help support her through her diagnosis. ‘Counselling did help me an awful lot. We unfortunately lost my dad in October 2023 just as I started counselling. Having the counselling support from Blythe House Hospice helped me so much, it helped me talk stuff through and help process my feelings and emotions at such a difficult time.

‘I would definitely recommend it. It was having someone to talk to who doesn’t know what is going on and I didn’t feel bad about telling my story again. Sometimes people ask you how you are, and you think do you really what to listen this?

‘I just needed to speak about it for it to make sense, for me to be able to deal with it in my own head. You can get a completely different view when talking to someone else, and it gave me other ideas and support, maybe think about it this way, maybe try this. It is definitely something I would recommend.

Jo couldn’t speak highly enough of the team she has seen. ‘They have been fantastic, absolutely amazing they do a fantastic job.’