Woman given year to live after bombshell cancer diagnosis months after wedding
Shweta Davis, 56, reached out to her former karate teacher Kenny Davis, 72, after she returned to Glasgow from decades abroad working as a scientific researcher. The pair quickly found love, and when the first covid lockdown was announced, just months after they started dating, Shweta, known to pals and family as Rimmy, moved in with Kenny in the countryside near Kirkintilloch.
The loved-up pair married at Citation, in Glasgow's Merchant City, on Easter weekend 2023, and honeymooned at Lake Garda, Italy. But seven months later, days before their first Christmas as husband and wife, they received the heartbreaking news that Rimmy had been diagnosed with terminal cancer, reports Glasgow Live.
Given just a year to live, she underwent surgery and intensive chemotherapy, butmedics found her type of cancer—known as platinum refractory—was not responding well to the treatment. Now, the couple are fundraising for a new treatment in London not yet available on the NHS.
Kenny described the drug as a 'game-changer' that could afford Rimmy a good quality of life 'for years' — but the treatment costs a whopping £4,000 per month.
Rimmy and her siblings began attending Kenny's karate classes in Glasgow in their late teens more than thirty years ago. However, the pair lost touch when Rimmy moved to the Netherlands and later to Finland to work as a medical researcher.
After moving back to Glasgow, she came across Kenny's Facebook profile and messaged him, and they met up as friends for coffee and cinema trips.
'It was as though thirty years hadn't happened,' said Rimmy, with the pair quickly falling in love, saying: 'Everyone else could see it before us.'
Kenny said: 'After a few of those dates, we both realised that maybe something a bit more interesting was going to happen.'
They began dating around Christmas 2019 and, when the covid lockdown was announced just months later, Rimmy decided to move in with Kenny and his dog in Chryston, near Kirkintilloch. 'We've been inseparable ever since,' said Kenny.
He added: 'Everything was looking fantastic, we were getting on really great and enjoying our lives together. And then, only seven months later, we got the devastating news.'
Rimmy learned she had stage four ovarian cancer, and that she had just a year to live. This specific type of cancer, known as platinum refractory cancer, is not as responsive to traditional chemotherapy.
She underwent surgery on the couple's first wedding anniversary and some of the tumour was removed, but surgeons could not completely remove the cancer.
Kenny said: 'It has gone from bad to worse from there. She was undergoing weekly chemo for six months, and you can imagine how draining that was both physically and mentally, spending three days each week in the Beatson.
In December 2024, Rimmy's chemotherapy was stopped as it was causing her unbearable side effects and having little effect on the cancer. A former medical research colleague told Rimmy about a new drug for platinum refractory cancers being trialled in the UK. Mirvetuximab Soravtansine was this week approved by the MHRA for use in the UK after earlier being approved by the FDA for use in the United States.
The drug has not yet been approved by the NICE for use for NHS patients in England and Wales. If it is, Scottish Intercollegiate Guidelines Network (SIGN) will then decide on its use in Scotland.
Until then, the couple must fund the life-prolonging treatment out of their own pockets but the treatment, which is given every three weeks, costs £3875, plus costs for travel to London and accommodation.
The couple has raised almost £20,000 for the treatment with a fundraiser and Rimmy underwent her first round of treatment last week.
Before starting the treatment, Rimmy was told by doctors that she has just months to live. Kenny said: 'But this drug is a game-changer, and she could potentially have a good quality of life for years, which is why we are desperate to have access to this for as long as possible.
'She's very upbeat and very positive, and she's doing everything she can.'
At the start of the covid lockdown just months after they began dating, Rimmy left her Glasgow flat, which had no outdoor space, to move into Kenny's home out in the country near Kirkintilloch.
Rimmy bought Kenny a vintage Volkswagen camper van after their honeymoon, and the pair planned to take it all across Europe. She said: 'But all this nonsense happened. Hopefully that will still happen. I keep teasing him that he thought he was getting a hot young wife, and now he's saddled with all this.'
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