Young Sunderland musician diagnosed with rare brain tumour - here's how you can help her fight for life

One of the city’s brightest young talents, Faye Fantarrow, 20, from East Herrington, has spent the past few years establishing herself on the live music scene with her soulful sound, winning the 2021 Alan Hull award for writing, tipped for the top by BBC Introducing and playing festivals such as Mouth of the Tyne and Stockton Calling.

This year, she got her biggest break yet – signing to fellow Mackem musician Dave Stewart’s Bay Street Records and flying to The Bahamas this summer to record her debut EP.

But, it was just two weeks after she returned in September that she began to feel unwell, experiencing headaches and extreme fatigue, which led to an earth shattering diagnosis of a rare type of aggressive glioma brain tumour.

In a further blow, there is no treatment for the tumour in the UK, which doctors say may have been a very rare side effect of leukaemia treatment, which Faye received twice in her younger years, beating the disease when she was just eight and battling it again in 2015 when she was 13.

As her world came crashing down, Faye had been in constant contact with her mentor Dave who found a CAR T cell trial at The City of Hope clinical research centre in California, putting money towards it, which has indeed brought hope.

Faye’s tumour meets the profile required for the trial and her consultant at Newcastle’s RVI hospital is liaising with doctors there to begin the process of collecting Faye’s cells for the start of the treatment – but she needs your help.

Around £450,000 is required to pay for the trial, which could involve many trips to the US to make infusions into her brain, with a JustGiving page launched to help her get there.

In just two days since the fund was launched, the Sunderland music community and beyond have donated £75,000 and it’s given the former St Robert of Newminster school pupil hope in the darkest of times.

Faye had been very wary of announcing her illness for fears it would affect her career, but she says the outpouring of support has been a real comfort.

"I really didn’t want it to affect my career,” she said. “I didn’t want to be an X Factor sob story after all the work I’ve done, but the support and words of encouragement I’ve received have been amazing. Knowing that everyone is 1000% behind me makes such a difference and has done wonders for my self esteem.

"I’m still adamant to do as much music as I can. This fundraiser has given me the chance of a future, a future doing the music I love. They’ve given me the chance of life and I want to give my music back as a thank you. Dave’s support has been incredible, he says he won’t allow my music to fall through the cracks, he’s been a real pillar of support.”

Speaking about receiving the diagnosis, she said: “I’d just returned from the Bahamas and I wondered if it was just jet lag or even the stress and excitement of what was going on, I’d just had the most insane experience of my life recording my EP.

"Headaches and fatigue can also be a symptom of leukaemia returning and spreading to my brain, but you just never assume it’s going to be as bad as it was. “My doctor has been great, he never gives up on his patients, and he’s very supportive of the trial.

"We don’t need to hit the target to start the process, but it’s so expensive because we don’t know how many infusions I’ll need.”

The next stage of Faye’s fight will be a scan at the end of November, when doctors will then know more about when she can travel to America for the initial cell collection.

The CAR T treatment involves using a patient's own T cells (a type of immune system cell), which are changed in the laboratory so they will attack cancer cells and then given back to the patient, which in Faye’s case would be the infusions direct to her brain.

:: You can donate to Fight for Faye at www.justgiving.com/crowdfunding/abigail-thompson-2