UK step-mom and daughter diagnosed with brain tumors months apart

A UK teen and her step-mom found support in each other as both women were diagnosed with large brain tumors within a year of each other.

Daisy Cranshaw, 16, is preparing for life with a brain tumor as her family grieves Tina’s terminal illness.

Daisy risks losing her parent, 51-year-old Tina, whose prognosis gave the mom of three only perhaps a year to live following an unsuccessful operation to remove the mass.

“Dad is gradually losing his wife, and I thought that he could also be losing me,” Daisy said. “It was horrible.”

Tina’s tumor was revealed when her words began to slur during a video conference in early 2020. Then, she began to smell gas. Her alarmed colleagues were compelled to call an ambulance to her home in South Yorkshire, England.

What doctors initially presumed were signs of a stroke turned out to be a large tumor, after a CT scan showed a “golf ball-sized” shadow in her brain.

“I was so worried, I kept thinking: ‘This may be the last time I see my step-mum,’ ” said Daisy.

Daisy had only just begun to reconcile her mom’s condition when she began to experience her own worrisome symptoms: excruciating headaches and a blind spot in one eye. An MRI would reveal that Daisy, too, was growing a tumor in her brain.

“It was the worst thing to hear, especially after seeing what my step-mum has gone through,” she said. “Dad is gradually losing his wife, and I thought that he could also be losing me. It was horrible.”

Daisy told SWNS that her symptoms began in February 2020. The Cranshaw’s family doctor believed Daisy was suffering a migraine at the time. It wasn’t until a follow-up in September 2021 that she reported the blind spot in her left eye, prompting doctors to order an emergency brain scan on Dec. 9.

Daisy then saw a specialist, who confirmed the mass, but also delivered good news — that the tumor is benign.

“I need to have scans every three months, but I’ve been told it’s not life-threatening and they don’t need to operate yet,” said Daisy.

She’s planning on walking 10,000 steps a day during the month of February to raise research funds on the types of tumors that have devastated her family.

“There is such a lack of research into this devastating disease and more needs to be done,” the student from North Yorkshire, England, told SWNS. “Not everyone is as fortunate as me,” she added.

She said it’s Tina who inspires her to stay strong for the family.

“She’s my inspiration in doing this as she always makes me persevere in everything I do,” said Daisy.