Lee Alan Thorp

thankyou for visiting my site of tribute for my beloved brother LEE who died on his 26th birthday (18th august 2003) from cancer. from here i want to share my story and experience with you of my brothers life and what we all as a family went through during the painful time of lees illness.

LEE was a fantastic brother, when we were little, growing up i would always look up to him, he was so popular even from a young age and had loads of friends. we would argue and fight like cat and dog and i suppose me being the little sister got in his way of so many things!!!!

As we both got older we became closer, and once i had left home after having a baby in september 2000 lee would play the role of doting uncle to rhiannon and pop round to see us whenever he could. it was amazing to see him like this as up until i had had rhiannon he had never even held a baby before...not interested in babies at all.

Lee was such a funny guy, he had so many friends most of them he had grown up with through school and they were all so close. he had a few girlfriends but was more interested in hanging out with the lads and living it up on a friday and saturday night up town!!!! i would often see them all out and it would always make my night....because once lee had a drink inside him he would always tell me how special i was to him and that he loved me!!! (i will cherish these memories forever!!) Lee was not one to show his emotions so these times would be the only times i would hear him say it!!!

sport mad, lee would always either be watching footie or playing it, my dad was manager of his team mappleborough fc.

so this was how life went on in the thorp household, everything great, no worries, no cares in the world. who would have thought that what was around the corner would change our lives forever.

Lee started to suffer from pains in his stomach....a long time before he was diagnosed. he took numerous trips to the doctors....all of which fobbed him off with irritable bowel syndrome.
the pain just got worse...so bad that lee could no longer play football, he would last 10 minutes or so and be in agony, his nights out also suffered in the same way, i would look for him but his mates would tell me he had gone home with his bad stomach. i started to worry as i new it must be fairly bad to cut his football and nights out short because of this.

in april of 2003 lee had started to lose some weight and said he could hardly eat because his stomach was hurting so much. mom and dad were getting realy concerned as to what could be the problem. we were all getting fed up with the local gp not investigating it further. according to them lee was young, fit and healthy so nothing serious could be wrong with him.....and oh how wrong they were.

12th april 2003 and lee was in so much pain that dad ended up taking him to a&e. they kept him in and decided to run some tests. i will never forget going to visit him in hospital the day after. mom & dad had just left and it was just the two of us. we were laughing because he was a 25 year old in a ward of little old men....one of which would never do his hospital gown up at the back and would get out of bed, bend down and show all his glory!!! (these are little memories i look back on and chuckle about).
Lee said to me that he was having some tests done on his liver but not to tell mom & dad as they would only worry. but of course i went home and told them...and he was right they were worried sick.

19th april 2003 (the day that changed my life forever) - easter saturday.
it was about 10.30am when i had a phone call from mom saying i needed to go round to the house asap as she had something to tell me. i begged her to tell me over the phone but there was no way she would. i dont even remember getting in the car, i knew something was really wrong and a thousand thoughts were going through my head. all i can remember is my mom opening the front door and seeing the look of complete devestation on her face, she told me to keep quiet as lee was upstairs, i felt relief for a second thinking if he was out of hospital he was ok.
i went through to lounge and she just looked at me and said "he's got cancer"
my dad picked me up off the floor and i could hear an awful wailing noise....seconds later recognising that wailing was coming from me. i had never seen my dad cry and for some reason that made it all worse, seeing my dad a broken man was an unbearable thing to see.
i had an almighty urge to go and see lee but so scared as to how he was going to be.
he was in his bedroom and as i was walikng up the stairs i heard him on the phone "ive got cancer mate" he said so matter of factly to one of his friends on the other end of the phone. i waited till he had finished his conversation, i walked in to him and just hugged him crying, he was hugging me back saying "dont worry it will be ok" he was so calm.

i dont remember much else of that day, endless phone calls and a sleepless night is all i can picture happening, the day after we all went back to the hospital to talk to a consultant about what lay ahead. i remember him saying it was terminal and they had found secondary cancer on lees liver. somehow then i knew we wouldnt have lee with us forever.

lees chemo started on 22nd may (my dads birthday) the nurses warned him it was a strong dose and to expect to lose his hair within about 10 days or so. after coming home lee asked me to shave his head...im a hairdresser and have shaved many heads in my time, but this was one persons i didnt want to do. lee took so much pride in his appearance and i knew he would hate not having any hair. but i did it and it was one of the worst things ive ever had to do. it looked really strange at first, but we soon got used to it.

nothing seemed to go in lees favour regarding the chemo. one particular type left him breathless so he had to come off it. and talk about chemo knocking you for six. lee was so ill with it, the weight just dropped off him, but because his liver wasnt working properly his stomach would fill with fluid which had to be drained regularly....a painful process added to everything else he was going through, sometimes up to 12 litres would be drained off.

Lee was amazing though, he hardly complained, im sure he just wanted to protect his family. he rairly talked about how he was feeling, just tried to carry on as normal. but i knew he was scared, my god who wouldnt be.

over the next 4 months Lee continued with his chemo but didnt seem to be getting any better. after a scan revealed the cancer had spread to his lungs i just had this awful feeling that we wouldnt have him for much longer.
it was a hot summer and we would try to do things as a family, bbq's etc and i have some great memories of lee paddling with rhiannon in her pool at mom & dads. she was only 2 and i remember thinking she wouldnt remember him when she got older, and i felt really sad at that thought but pushed it to the back of my mind almost thinking that a miracle could happen.

9th august 2003 Lees friend had organised a bbq at her house for his birthday. all his mates were there, one big regret is that didnt go, i cant remember now why i didnt. but he didnt stay long, too tired and too ill, mom and dad picked him up around 10pm....none of his freinds knew that that would be the last time they ever saw him.

12th august (tuesday) lee developed a really sore throat, we had the doctor out to him but he just gave him some other kind of tablet to go with the rest of his many to take away the pain. we just thought it might be a reaction to the chemo as the doctors had changed his dose to a much higher one.
i popped round to see him the day after (wednesday). my mobile had broken so he said i could have his old one for £20!!!! i got the phone and told him i would give him the money at the weekend (this was the last proper conversation i had with him, and i never got to give him the £20) i stayed for a bit and then left, telling him i would see him tomorrow.
(thursday) mom rang me to say she was taking lee back to the hospital because of his throat, he wasnt well at all so the docs at the hospital told mom to bring him in. to be honest this happened a lot so i never thought the worst could happen at all, i arranged that i would go to the hospital to see him some time the next day.

15th august (friday). mom rang and i knew something was dreadfully wrong as soon as i heard her voice, lee had been taken into intensive care, he had had a really bad night and wasnt well at all. she told me to come to the hospital straight away. after sending rhiannon to her other nans i sped the 15 mile or so to the QE in birmingham ran up to the ward and saw mom & dad...i cant even explain the look on their faces, i knew it was bad,
after an hour or so we were allowed to go down to intensive care to see lee. i remember everytime we went in we had to wash our hands in this alcohol stuff (i can still smell it now).
lee was hooked up to so many wires, he was awake but very delerious. he looked frightened to be where he was. i kept thinking hes going to be in hospital for his birthday, he will hate that!!
a doctor took us to one side, he told us lee was seriously ill and to prepare for the worst, how we coped at the time hearing those words i will never know. one by one lees organs were shutting down. he drifted in and out of consciousness, none of us dared to leave his side.
family members were arriving to see him....we told him they were coming to wish him happy birthday for monday...he seemed ok with that. we didnt dare tell him what could happen. how can you possibly tell someone you love so much that they havent got long to live.
by the saturday night (16th) lee had slipped into a deep sleep. we sat as a family stroking his hair, talking to him (this is hard for me to write now). not believing what we were going through. why us?
early on the sunday morning (17th) doctors advised us to let the machines be turned off so lee could slip away, we couldnt believe the timing being so near to his birthday, they said it would be sometime that day.

after the machines were turned off we sat around just looking at my beautiful brother, knowing that we were about to face life without him forever more, i couldnt imagine it, i kept thinking im never going to speak to him again, never going to laugh with him. we hadnt slept since thursday night but somehow now sleep was the last thing anyone could do. god knows how our bodies were coping with the enormous stress we were going through.
i remember midnight came, it was his 26th birthday. i leant over him and whispered happy birthday bro, hoping he could hear me and will himself to wake up and get better.
throughout the night the nurses would come in and say "its soon now" i would look at the heart monitor and see his heart beating slower but then quickening up as tho he was fighting it. it was draining to watch. at 5.55am the heart monitor started to slow again but this time it got slower and slower, i knew that this was time. i put my head on his chest and held his hand as my beloved brother took in his last breath. i looked at the heart monitor..... 0. he had gone. mom and dad were hugging. i had to walk out the cubicle. i remember looking out of the window up towards the sky...but it seemed so big, he could be anywhere now.

i cant talk about that day after that because i cant remember it. the funeral passed in a complete blur. his mate did a beautiful speech about him. and we played "you'll never walk alone". as he was an avid liverpool fan. over 400 people attended, he was such a well liked person, i still dont know why it had to be him, for this reason i cant believe in god. all i know is that heaven must have been short of angels.

lee would have been 30 on 18th august this year. a huge birthday i know he would have celebrated in style. i miss him so much but ill love him forever.