My Name is not Sandi 🇺🇦

Random thoughts, rants and feelings from my crazy mind.

[My Name is not Sandi 🇺🇦 @LittleMsCalm]

@Humberboy101 @lyncey_gilbe This could very well be the route to take, otherwise she will have that same initial shock and grief every time she is told.

[My Name is not Sandi 🇺🇦 @LittleMsCalm]

@ciaraspinkpod I rarely answer numbers I don't recognise, the ones I do are local calls

[My Name is not Sandi 🇺🇦 @LittleMsCalm]

Look how much I learned on Duolingo in 2025! How did you do? #Duolingo365

[My Name is not Sandi 🇺🇦 @LittleMsCalm]

@ShirtytrisH @DonnaDlm71 Childhood Christmas memory unlocked! 🥲 Thank you

[My Name is not Sandi 🇺🇦 @LittleMsCalm]

@RetirementTales This day was ignored by SLT at my workplace I'm not even surprised

[My Name is not Sandi 🇺🇦 @LittleMsCalm]

@ciaraspinkpod

[Charlotte's Battle Against Glioblastoma (BAG) @alexeades1]

Charlotte's brain tumour journey raising awareness
18.2.97 - 24.2.2016
Diagnosis to death 951 days

Charlotte's words in 2014:

'When I was diagnosed I'd just finished Year 11 of school. I was meant to be starting college. Because of my anxiety disorder, I had a fear of using public transport, but I pushed myself to get over it so I could go to college. I felt like it was my chance to get away from everything and move on, but cancer held me back.

Having cancer has made me reassess my goals. I was meant to be studying Health and Beauty, but now I want to work with children with cancer. I thought, because I've been through it myself, I could relate and let them know it will be okay. Obviously, my health has suffered. However, in my mind, cancer has done me good. It's given me confidence.

Having cancer really changed my perspective: this is one of the worst things you can experience, everything else seems insignificant.  I've had generalised anxiety disorder for most of my life.  I still haven't tried to get on a bus or a train, but I'll go up to people now, more than ever before, and talk about my brain tumour journey.'

This photo was her last school photo taken in May 2013 two months prior to a brain tumour diagnosis.

Charlotte was 16. Please RT with thanks
https://t.co/Ox60Th4rfn

[Charlotte's Battle Against Glioblastoma (BAG) @alexeades1]

Thank you, @LloydsBank, for targeting small charities like https://t.co/Ox60Th4rfn  whose turnover is under £250,000 a year.

From November, my first 100 monthly payments may be free, but after that, I’ll have to pay. You’re also charging 50p for every cheque I pay in.

Your profits are through the roof  so WHY are you doing this?

I have the CEO’s email address, so I’ll be sending him a message directly.

Please RT TY

[My Name is not Sandi 🇺🇦 @LittleMsCalm]

@RetirementTales It has to be Phil Collins he played at the concert in London and Philadelphia Another Day in Against All Odds is my favourite 😍
A ploughmans and a fruit cider please

[Charlotte's Battle Against Glioblastoma (BAG) @alexeades1]

10 Years ago today 6.7.2015
Charlotte's brain tumour journey raising awareness
18.2.97 - 24.2.2016
Diagnosis to death 951 days

Every year at the school where I work, we host an Activity Week.

Years 7 and 8 stay on site for fun activities. Year 9 take part in trips and camping. Year 10 has a more structured week  and this year, the focus was on raising awareness around cancer.

Charlotte was invited to help.

She was joined by Ryan, a brave young man in remission from testicular cancer. Together, they spoke to Year 10s not just as survivors and fighters, but as young people who truly understood what it meant to live with and beyond diagnosis.

Charlotte, once such a highly anxious individual, stood at the front of that classroom and bloomed. Confident, warm, and composed, she asked:
“Does anyone watch YouTube?”

Hands flew up.

She shared that she had a channel  and played her video, "I’m Still Here."
At that point, most of the students still didn’t know she had cancer.

As the video played, I watched the room. Girls silently cried. Some boys looked stunned, even shaken. When the lights came back on, Charlotte explained what it was like to live with cancer  the medication: the appointments, the uncertainty.

She and Ryan left an impression that day I know those students will carry for the rest of their lives.

Charlotte didn’t just raise awareness. She gave her peers something far more powerful: honesty, courage, and connection.

The big difference with our charity is that we self-fund. 100% of donations go directly to research at Charlotte's Lab, King's College Hospital, London.We have no salaries, overheads, advertising, or merchandise, just the story of a brave and wonderful young woman shared through her YouTube channel.We pay our own expenses, including PayPal & PO Box fees, so your donations really make a difference.If you’re thinking of donating to a charity, please consider us. 
https://t.co/Ox60Th4rfn

[Charlotte's Battle Against Glioblastoma (BAG) @alexeades1]

My daughter died of a brain tumour 951 days after she was diagnosed. For 741 of those days she suffered from grade 3 Anaplastic Astrocytoma. For 210 days she endured grade 4 glioblastoma - a terminal cancer. Standard NHS treatment is radiotherapy/chemotherapy - there has been no advancement in treatment since temozolomide, a chemotherapy, was licensed in 1999.

Charlotte's first 741 days were, on the whole like many other young peoples' - she was very lonely, scared and had little to look forward to. She had no choice but to make her own entertainment, so she decided to document her brain cancer journey.

"When I'm dead, take my YouTube channel down - nobody will ever be interested in a girl with a brain tumour." These were some of the last words she said to her brother, Miles, and I.

In the last few weeks, Charlotte's most viewed video was recommended by YouTube; this generated another 500,000 views and another 4700 subscribers. To date, the total views of the videos on her channel stand at close to 25 million. When Charlotte died, she had 4,000 subscribers. She now has close to 80,000. Comments are left daily and I read every single one.

On Tuesday, Miles and I travel to Charlotte's Lab, based in King's College Hospital, London, to be interviewed by @BBCBreakfast along with two members of  the Charlotte's BAG team.

If you're thinking of donating to a self funding charity, please think of us.
Please RT TY
18.2.97 - 24.2.16

https://t.co/Ox60Th4rfn

https://t.co/AbRuF0aJV8

[Premier League @premierleague]

In April @NUFC head coach Eddie Howe was admitted to hospital with pneumonia.

Watch as he returns to the same hospital to thank the staff who helped him with his recovery 🫂

[My Name is not Sandi 🇺🇦 @LittleMsCalm]

@Melissassmile Hope you’ve had an amazing day Kathryn 🎈

[Charlotte's Battle Against Glioblastoma (BAG) @alexeades1]

"When I'm dead, take my YouTube channel down - nobody will ever be interested in a girl with a brain tumour."

For a change, it's Miles here. My mother and I decided not to take Charlotte's YouTube channel down. Instead, we wanted to use it as Charlotte had intended, as a means to spread awareness of child and young adult cancer sufferers. Charlotte's channel continues to grow and it is of incredible comfort to read the grateful comments left by people from all over the world. Charlotte sugar-coated nothing: her videos are honest and candid. My mother's greatest wish is to get Charlotte the silver YouTube button that she so deserves and never believed her channel would achieve.

Over the last two weeks. Charlotte's video was recommended and this generated another 300 thousand views and another 2800 subscribers. To date, the total views of the videos on the channel stand at nearly 25 million. When Charlotte died she had 4,000 subscribers. She now has close to 78,000. Comments are left daily and my mother reads every single one.

To help my mother achieve Charlotte's dream, we need to get to 100,000 subscribers. We would love to do this before what would have been Charlotte's 29th birthday in February. If you could RT, it would be appreciated hugely.

If you could hit the YouTube subscribe button we would be so grateful.

RT would also be highly appreciated.
https://t.co/AbRuF0aJV8

[My Name is not Sandi 🇺🇦 @LittleMsCalm]

@afra_art56 Absolutely AMAZING 🤩

[Purdey & Bramble & Jet OTRB 🌈 3/5/23 @JetBlackLab2019]

make this guy famous please? A true angel of the road! on a 700 mile trip as a lone female + 2 dogs relocate to the Isle of Lewis with a van load of furniture I discovered a nail in my tire & prayed 4 help. It came in a lay-by with this lovely #RAC man on a break #rescued #rac ❤️

[Jil Theo @theo_jil]

That's a wrap!
Thanks so much for reading.
I hope you enjoyed this thread.

If it did, I'd appreciate it if:
1. You followed me @theo_jil
2. You liked, commented & RT it with your audience

https://t.co/7aVNtkPuZP

[Charlotte's Battle Against Glioblastoma (BAG) @alexeades1]

For those followers who have been following my saga with @RoyalMail this was my response to their email.
I could really have done without this.

Thank you for your email regarding the non collection of posts from my P O Box number. I don't think you appreciate the gravity of distress this has caused myself and our donors. You say that delivery scales for 1st and 2nd class are not guaranteed but you aim for 1st class the next working day. I again posted a first class letter to my PO box last over a week ago (31st March) . This still hasn't arrived 10 days later. Is my box being emptied or will it be forgotten until March 2027?

Please do not try to put any of the blame onto me. I have had a box since 19.2.2019 and never had a problem until now. There was no confusion as to whether the mail was collected or delivered. My mail was always delivered. I don't even know where the physical box is.  You say that this does not date back to 2023 I can assure you it does as I have the uncashed cheques to prove it. You then go on to say that you can't offer an explanation for these delays. I certainly can, my box was never emptied because of gross negligence on behalf of Royal Mail.

You have no idea how frustrating it is not to receive cheques addressed to a charity. Throughout your whole email you do not even mention the cheques that I could not cash, only acknowledging a two year refund for the payments I had made to pay for my PO Box.

Moving forward. I would like a substantial donation to our charity to cover all the cheques I could not cash and all the inconvenience you have caused me. I would like a guarantee that the PO box will be emptied regularly and I will be sending 'test' letters to check.

The money we have lost may be an insignificant sum to you but to us it pays for consumables needed in brain tumour research.

As I said in my original email dated 28th March. I will not let this matter rest until I have a satisfactory outcome. I await your response.

https://t.co/Ox60Th4rfn

https://t.co/AbRuF0aJV8

Please RT

[My Name is not Sandi 🇺🇦 @LittleMsCalm]

@alexeades1 Time is too slow for those who wait,
Too swift for those who fear,
Too long for those who grieve,
Too short for those who rejoice,
But for those who love, time is eternity.