Cancer sufferer upset at treatment

Jeni shows a picture of how she looked before cancer wrecked her appearance and her life.

CHRIS ISON CI--

JENI Lee's battle with an aggressive tumour has left her disfigured.

But it's the insensitive reaction of people to her appearance that hurts most. Jeni, who lives in Emu Park, says she's sick of being ridiculed and humiliated by people who point and recoil in horror at her terrible scars.

After being refused service in restaurants and shops, she says all she's asking for is a little compassion as she attempts to rebuild a life wrecked by the cancer which has destroyed her faith in human nature.

Her natural beauty wrecked by the rare sarcoma, Jeni bravely agreed to remove the dressing that normally hides the horrific consequences of the cancer and the operations she's had so far.

She wants people to see how her face has been eaten away by the disease in the hope she will be shown compassion and understanding in her final months.

For despite the hours she spent on the operating table, the sarcoma is spreading and she's been told she has a maximum of two years before it claims her life.

Forthright and brutally honest, she says she's been shocked by the cruelty displayed towards her.

“I've been asked to leave restaurants in Yeppoon and Rockhampton because my appearance was upsetting. And I've been mocked and laughed at by children at the airport.

“I rarely go out now and when I do I wait until late at night to do my shopping because there will be fewer people about.

“I hate going out actually because I am sick and tired of being stared at. I don't expect to be looked at as though I am a piece of dirt.”

Although she is resigned to dying, she plans to go through with oncology and plastic surgery to reconstruct her nose and lips and rebalance her face and will soon leave for the first of at least four painful operations.

Jeni was stung to react by the online comments on The Morning Bulletin website to a story about the additional cost to regional patients when they have to travel away for essential treatment.

After sending a message detailing the financial strain she's under travelling to Sydney for operations and radiotherapy, she was appalled to read a critical post from a regular correspondent who signs his contributions Equarights.

It said: “Having an illness doesn't give you automatic right to free handouts. Why should it? If you are ill and complaining about money then perhaps you should reassess what's really important in life.”

That got Jeni really angry.

“Who is this jerk? My treatment has cost me $5500 so far in air fares and accommodation in Sydney. I can't work. If I couldn't afford to stand those costs, I would be dead by now and yet he calls them handouts.”

She said she wonders if it would be a different story if the politicians who have refused to increase accommodation allowances for 23 years had to endure some of the pain and the stress themselves.