'My first night in hospital was the night the lockdown was announced' - Elaine Scully

This time last year when we were all facing the fear and uncertainty of the first Covid-19 lockdown, mother-of-two Elaine Scully from Carlow was hearing the words “you have cancer.”

“My husband Niall dropped me to A&E in Kilkenny and waited in the carpark, thinking he’d be bringing me home,” recalls Elaine. “I didn’t get to see him or my sons or anyone again for five weeks. I was sent by ambulance the next day to St. James’s Hospital. My first night in James’s was the night the lockdown was announced and everyone was told to stay at home. That was very surreal and upsetting. I felt like I was the only person in the country who had been taken from their home when everyone else was being told to stay there.”

While Elaine was apart from her family, thoughts of her two sons Dylan (26) and Jack (18) brought her strength: “When you hear the words leukemia or cancer you just fear the worst. But I remember my first night in hospital, closing my eyes and thinking how lucky I was - the life I’ve had with my boys and how special they are and the relationship we have. That got me through. Knowing I had so much at home waiting for me definitely gave me strength.”

Elaine’s chemotherapy began within days of her arrival to St James’s Hospital. Her leukemia required numerous rounds of in-patient chemotherapy, which meant long stays in hospital without visitors. 

 “Because of Covid I had to have an isolated room,” Elaine explains. “Normally I would have been allowed to have visitors. Covid made it a lot harder.

“Every single night at 7.00pm I had Facetime calls with my sons and husband. We would chat and laugh and play games. Some nights I’d be exhausted and might only last a couple of minutes.

“Whenever I spoke to my sons they’d try to be upbeat and positive. They never voiced a fear. Their reaction to my leukemia was, ‘Mam is going to get through this. She can do it.’” 

Elaine’s final chemotherapy was last October, and she was able to go home at last. 26-year-old Dylan moved back to the family home too to spend more time with his Mam, which Elaine says meant the world to her. Her other son Jack surprised her with a heartfelt letter: “The letter just floored me. It’s not often that a teenage boy will show you his sensitive side. But he wrote a lovely note saying that watching how strong I was helped him to be strong. That he couldn’t have gotten through it without seeing how I was dealing with it. I couldn’t believe it. To think of doing it and to put those words together was just so special.”

Elaine is waiting for her platelets to fully recover, but she says other than that she’s doing fine now: “Being at home and being able to hug my husband and my sons is amazing.”