Philomena Lynott has revealed her cancer is back for the second time.
The mother of Thin Lizzy’s Phil Lynott was diagnosed with lung cancer two years ago lung but beat it with radiotherapy.
Sadly Philomena discovered the cancer had returned last month after getting a routine scan, but the 86-year-old admitted that she does not want to get treatment this time around.
“The cancer is regrowing and I have refused treatment because I don’t want chemotherapy. I think it kills you and that’s that,” she told the Irish Sun.
“I told the doctor and she said she admired me for that. If I start having chemotherapy I would come back home and curl up in the bed and be cranky. I don’t want to leave this planet in that situation.”
The Dublin native added that she will go, “when they are ready to call me”.
Philomena’s rock star son died in 1986, and she joked that he wouldn’t want her to join him yet.
“I’m sure Phil keeps telling Holy God, ‘Don’t let her come up here because she will batter me.”
She added that her diagnosis has meant that she is reflecting on her long life.
“At night when I’m on my own in my bedroom, I go back down memory lane and what mistakes did I make.
“But having said that, for my age, I have had a good innings, a lot of people don’t make it this far. For my age, I am able to drive, able to put Polyfilla on my face and look glamorous if I have to. People say don’t you look good for your age but we are all caretakers of our own bodies.”
The author added that when she first got diagnosed, the treatment was difficult to get through.
“It was around August, when they have parties to celebrate Phil’s birthday, that they diagnosed me with the lung cancer. I went for radiotherapy. I took all the treatment so it got me through that one.”.
“There was no pain taking that treatment but when you leave the hospital after the treatment you fall asleep. If I went on radiotherapy again, I’d be yawning morning, noon and night.”
“They put me under the machine because they said they really wanted to get to the bottom of what was going on with my cancer. After the scan they sat me down and said that the cancer was regrowing at such a rate.”
The brave woman added that her illness won’t get her down.
“You sit there stunned but what can you do? What can you do? At the same time, I can’t go around looking sad.”
“They told me they were going to operate on me and go in from my back. That way they could go in and take away the cancer that was regrowing.
“I didn’t want that and in the end they decided they weren’t going to do that because it was too dangerous because the radiotherapy had gone too near my airwaves. So the end of the story is they are keeping an eye on me.”
Philomena also opened up about how the death of her son, at just 36, changed her life.
“When Philip died, I died with him. I acquired a nervous shake from the grief and I had gone down to just six stone in weight because all I was doing was drinking brandy and smoking.
“It took me a few years to get hold of myself after he died but after meeting a woman who lost three kids in the Stardust disaster, I changed. She was grieving for three kids but I was grieving for one.”
