13/05/2026
May is brain tumour awareness month.
One of our reasons why we created our charity was to help fund brain tumour awareness and research after our own son Caleb was diagnosed age 3 with a rare aggressive brain tumour we never knew much about brain tumours until it entered our family’s life.
Brain tumour signs to watch out for in children are as follows:_
Symptoms and Diagnosis Symptoms in children can be varied and often mimic other illnesses, leading to longer diagnosis times (median over 3 months).
Parents should watch for:Headaches:Particularly if persistent or waking the child. (Caleb had this over a period of 4days however at the age of 3 he shouldn't know what a headache is so should have been red flagged at A&E which sadly it wasnt)
Vomiting: Especially in the morning.(Caleb violently vomited every 30mins over 12hrs when he first took ill)
Vision/Eye Changes: Blurred vision, diplopia (double vision), or involuntary eye movements.
Behavioral/Physical Changes:
Fatigue, lack of motivation, balance issues
(Caleb started to walk inwards towards his pram in the weeks leading up to his diagnosis we didn't think anything as he was a late walker due to being premature and at the time he had a weakness in his left hand side which had been picked up previously)
On relapse Caleb had Fatigue signs as he started to sleep a lot more.
(ataxia), or regression in milestones.
Head Size: Increasing head circumference in infants.
If you ever have these symptoms present in a child please go with your gut we got sent home 3 times and on the 4th I demanded he be looked at if I hadn't he would have gone home to die as he had sadly already started heomaraging and nobody had picked up on it.
This is why we need better education in GP surgeries and A&E as sadly too many times children are overlooked and deemed as rare however despite this Brain tumours are the leading cause of death in cancer for the under 40s children being included in this statistic.
