Young Adelaide mum Milly Mitchell’s shock health discovery after she relocated to Australia for a ‘new beginning’ and was ‘brushed off’ by GPs when she lost weight and felt constant fatigue

A young mum is fighting for life after doctors ‘brushed off’ her unintentional weight loss and constant fatigue for a year. 

Milly Mitchell, 27, relocated from New Zealand to Australia three years ago to be closer to her parents and embark on a ‘new beginning’, not knowing her world was about to be rocked by cervical cancer.

Just months after settling down in Adelaide, she started struggling with extremely heavy periods, recurring UTIs, unintentional weight loss and constant fatigue.

Ms Mitchell said she saw five different doctors in an attempt to find out what was wrong, but just kept getting dismissed as ‘too young for cancer’.

‘One of them was female and she actually told me that what I’m experiencing is completely normal for someone who has endometriosis, and she gave me a hormonal pill to stop prolonged periods, but at that time I’d had my period for four months,’ she told Daily Mail Australia.

‘They told me I was too young to consider gynaecological cancer because it’s more common in women in their 40s or going through menopause.’ 

A year after she first sought help, Ms Mitchell took herself to hospital, where doctors found a ‘fast and aggressive’ 8cm tumour and that the disease had also spread to her pelvic lymph nodes.

Ms Mitchell underwent six blood transfusions and began daily radiotherapy alongside weekly four-hour chemotherapy sessions and internal radiation to ‘blast the tumour’.

After her treatment her family moved into their own home and life was starting to look sunny again, but then everything came to a screeching halt. 

Just two weeks ago Ms Mitchell received the devastating news that the cancer had spread to her lungs and spine.

‘When the cancer spread to my pelvic lymph nodes, the lymph nodes spread it into different parts of my body and they weren’t able to see that at the time,’ she said.  

‘I had a six-monthly PET scan… three days later I presented myself back at the emergency department with severe back pain and that was when the doctor told me that my cancer had come back. 

‘I was sitting all alone in the little hospital cubicle… when the doctor broke the news to me I just started crying.’

The mum will now undergo stronger chemotherapy and radiation to her chest and spine in a desperate bid to save her life. 

Ms Mitchell wishes the GPs had taken her more seriously because her cancer would never have ‘gotten this far’. 

On Thursday she found out the cancer has now spread to her clavicle, chest, ribs, both hips and right femur. 

‘It’s hard because now I’m stage four and I’m being put on palliative care… I’ve got a four-year-old son and I want to be here to watch him grow,’ she said.

‘It’s not my time to go yet.

‘If my body doesn’t take to this treatment, then unfortunately I’ll get the bad news of how long I’ll have, so we just have our fingers and toes crossed that this treatment works.

‘We’ve been told to prepare for the worst… At 27 I never imagined that I’d be sorting out my will and trying to set my son up the best I can for the future.’     

Ms Mitchell has set up a GoFundMe to try and help the family cover their rent and daycare costs now that she’s unable to work and relying on one income.   

Her partner, Declan, shared a heartbreaking update on Sunday.

‘Firstly and most importantly we want to thank you so so much for the messages of support, and your donations,’ he said. 

‘I hate to be the bringer of bad news, but on Friday we confirmed Milly’s Stage 4 diagnosis and also confirmed that the cancer is in fact in the bones and has been spread via lymph nodes and blood stream.

‘Her treatment is palliative as she’s unfortunately incurable, so the focus is on pain management.’

Ms Mitchell is urging people to remember that cancer doesn’t discriminate and can take ‘anyone, anytime’. 

‘It’s just so important to advocate for yourself and get second opinions,’ she said. 

‘If you know in yourself that something’s wrong you need to keep pushing until someone actually listens.’