A presenter from The Project was left on the radio fighting back tears as he celebrated the courage of a terminally ill woman battling an aggressive form of cancer.
On Sunday night, Channel 10’s show aired the powerful interview between Georgie Tunny and Emily Lahey, a young woman from Melbourne who is sharing some of her final moments to raise money for cancer research.
Ms Lahey, 31, was diagnosed with stage four NUT carcinoma four years ago after a tumour the size of a cricket ball was found behind her sinuses.
Because little was known about the disease, she was told she had only 6 to 9 months to live. Yet she fought on and survived the disease.
However, a recent scan revealed that the cancer had spread to her brain, and doctors cannot say how long she has left to live.
Ms Lahey has launched Time to Live, an exhibition in Sydney where strangers pay to spend three precious minutes with her.
Ms Lahey hoped her story would help Australians understand what it is like to live with a terminal illness.
Her heartbreaking story made an impression on Tunny during their emotional interview, as she said she had “such a sweet spirit” as she struggled to hold back tears.
The Project presenter Georgie Tunny (pictured) has left the city in tears after interviewing a ‘heroic’ Australian woman who used her remaining time to raise money for cancer awareness
During the interview, a visibly upset Tunny wiped away tears as she asked Ms. Lahey if she “ever gets angry at the world” about the cruel situation she finds herself in.
“F*** yes I do… it makes me so angry,” the brave woman admitted.
“I think you just have to ride the wave of looking at things from a different perspective, and not just being stuck in the daily grind.”
Tunny told her the story would “stay with me for the rest of my life,” holding a handkerchief.
The interview brought back emotional memories for Tunny, who found solace in fellow presenter Rachel Corbett as the panel
The other presenters on Sunday’s panel also praised Ms. Lahey for her openness, despite the time she had left.
“Stories like this remind you how precious life is,” said Michael Hing.
“The fact that she uses those precious moments for cancer research and fundraising in what I imagine are really uncomfortable conversations is heroic.”
Corbett said the impact Ms Lahey had on Ms Tunny and on those who visited the exhibition was “her legacy”.
“We take a lot of things for granted… so if you have time and you’re lucky enough to have it, you might as well use it well,” she said.
“It’s incredible to get people thinking about this, because we don’t think about it enough.”
Melbourne woman diagnosed with cancer, Emily Lahey (pictured), has allowed strangers to spend some of her last precious minutes with her as a living work of art Time to Live
An emotional Mrs. Lahey admitted that she feared death the most.
“Because someone dies and the world keeps turning. The world doesn’t stop,” she said.
A tearful Tunny added: “We have to keep going.”
Mrs. Lahey spoke about her life before her diagnosis: she was a “fit” young woman who ran 5 to 10 km every day and believed that cancer was not an option.
She was working in the military at the time and said she wanted to ‘start a family and travel a lot more’.
According to her doctors, she had become a “popular child” because so many people wanted to research the rare cancer that she and only a handful of people in the world are diagnosed with each year.
The cancer is highly resistant to treatment, requiring an aggressive form of chemotherapy to combat the cancer.
The extra time she gained allowed her to tick off tasks from her ‘living list’, including swimming with whale sharks, abseiling from the Gordon Dam in Tasmania, swimming in the pool at Singapore’s famous Marina Bay Sands and marrying her partner Jason, whom she met just weeks before she was diagnosed with cancer.
Expressions of interest for Time to Live are available here.
