THE Devenish is set to open its doors to welcome a ‘fight night’ in aid of West Belfast’s own ‘Sunflower’ Sharon McCloskey as part of the Save Our Sunflower campaign.
The Andersonstown News reported back in June on the launch of the campaign after the Mount Eagles mother-of-three was diagnosed with blood cancer in February. The chef had already undergone months of grueling chemotherapy and had learnt that an extremely rare stem cell transplant was her only way of preventing the cancer from returning.
Over 14,000 people in the North have registered to become stem cell donors since the campaign launched with swab and information events taking place to find the all important stem cell matches for those in need.
Speaking on behalf of the campaign group, Ursula Dunne and Carrie Crossan explained how Pure Gym’s Matthew Fitzsimmons approached them about organising an event to help Sharon.
“Matthew offered to organize the white collar boxing, he offered to do this for Sharon – he’s not asking for anything in return,” said Ursula.
“Sharon and her husband Alan have been off work for six months now, Sharon is only getting her stem cell transplant now so it’s going to be a long road ahead, it could be up to two years,” she said. “We are just trying to raise as much money as we can. We’ve done loads of fundraising events so far and people and businesses have been brilliant with their donations. Loads of people have been donating prizes and vouchers from Ciara Daly makeup to an overnight stay at the Europa hotel. Alan, Sharon’s husband works for Solarium and they have been brilliant as well.”
Carrie spoke of how Sharon has to undergo seven days of chemotherapy before her stem cell transplant begins next Tuesday.
“Sharon will be getting a bag of chemo everyday, the most she’s ever had. She usually gets three, on a Monday, Wednesday and Friday and this will be seven rounds. She said it’s like ‘bringing you to the point of death and then bringing you back again’. She will lose all her hair again, her eyelashes and when she is at her weakest that’s when she will be given the stem cell transplant.”
She continued: “We are still holding stem cell registration events which have been agreat successes and we will be at Windsor Park on Monday night during Germany vs Northern Ireland to register people on the night. There is already a great buzz around the boxing night and we hope people will get behind Sharon and come up to support it.”
The fight night to raise funds for the Save Our Sunflower campaign will take at the Devenish complex on Friday September 13. All are welcome and tickets are priced at £10. For ticket information contact Ursula on 07752366742.
To make a donation to the Save Our Sunflower gofundme page visit: https://www.gofundme.com/f/dd43j-save-our-sunflower
