Beverley holds an at home tea party to remember her mum, Lillie

Beverley from Manchester sadly lost her mum, Lillie, to bowel cancer in December 2019. In April 2020 Beverley put the kettle on and enjoyed a virtual catch up with family and friends. It turned out to be a wonderful way to celebrate their birthdays. This is Beverley's story:

At the beginning of 2019 my mum had started to lose weight and feel very tired without reason, she had spotted blood in her stool on just one occasion and this prompted her to go and speak with her GP and was referred for tests and a colonoscopy.

On my birthday in April 2019 the results came in and mum was diagnosed with bowel cancer, this was also the day before mum's 68th Birthday. The news was devastating and unexpected; she was sadly diagnosed at a late stage 4.

Mum was referred to the Christie Hospital to begin chemotherapy treatment, she remained positive throughout and she never once complained. She continued to try and enjoy life as much as possible in between her chemotherapy sessions.

Mum and I share April birthdays and we boasted that our 2020 birthday would be over a bank holiday Easter weekend which we would make the most of. Mum was determined to put up a fight and gave it every bit of strength she had, but unfortunately she lost this battle on 17 December 2019. This sadly meant that my April Easter weekend birthday was now going to be without mum.

But I had to try and face this as mum would have wanted and to enjoy my birthday celebrations. One of mum's favourite things to do was to go out for afternoon tea. It felt the right thing to celebrate by taking part in Bowel Cancer Awareness Month with a Brew Together event.

So I signed up and began to plan my event.

Then came the lockdown due to coronavirus!

I thought about cancelling the event, I even considered cancelling my birthday altogether but then I thought about my mum's life attitude of "Que Sera Sera, it is what it is".

I realised that the only way to still do this event would be to hold my Brew Together virtually and so I invited people to my virtual birthday bash. I invited friends and family to contact me virtually to share a cuppa and a chat with me on what would have been Mum's 69th Birthday.

I just asked if they would consider contributing the price of a brew to my JustGiving page. I put a big kettle on, made a few cakes and enjoyed a virtual catch up with family and friends. It turned out to be a wonderful way to celebrate our birthdays and remember my mum and almost £500 was raised.

This year I plan to sign up to do the event again in the hope with restrictions lifted that I can meet up with people for a brew and hopefully raise some funds for a very much needed cause.

If you're inspired by Beverley to hold your own Brew Together event at home, then sign up today or get in touch with our fundraising team at community@bowelcanceruk.org.uk or call 020 7940 1769