The idea of using the experience of helping people who were cancer sufferers with complementary therapies was first conceived after looking after Catriona. Having amassed a lot of valuable information and also seeing that using complementary therapies was both popular and beneficial,  it seemed right to tell people. But more than this it is clear that the very act of being in some sort of control gave people a sort of pride in what they were doing for themselves.

As a homeopathic practitioner I knew that people in extremis will always act in a different way. Catriona was an open person in nature and she loved to make those around her feel better even when she was undergoing the various fairly nasty treatments of chemotherapy and radiotherapy. She gave others encouragement, made them laugh and did it her way. But she also liked other people to find out for her what possibilities were available. When she knew the options she went for it. She was not the sort who just talked about fighting, that wasn’t her language. It was about maximising options.  So she tried many varied approaches, such as seeing healers and vitamin C therapy. We combined that with having as much fun as possible! And she lived 8 years after a diagnosis of stage 4 aggressive breast cancer. She had no surgery and the affected breast remained healthy.

I realised  that the important factor was information and availability of help. There needed to be somewhere to go to find these things and when you are ill you often don’t know how or feel like looking. After Catriona died I started talking to practitioners about my idea and found a lot of sympathy. It soon became clear though that I would have to be the one to do start it going.

At first I thought of The Golden Centre as a place, still do,  but I also wanted the service to be available nationally and internationally. I also started thinking about how to help people to afford to use complementary therapies. This mission statement emerged.

“The Golden Centre mission is to provide, mainly through complementary therapies, a life and health support service, primarily but not exclusively, to people who are cancer sufferers. Our purpose is to help you take control of your situation and use as many ways as you possibly can to feel that you are doing something about making your life and health better in your own terms, through taking positive action and being informed.”

The Maggie Centres do the same sort of things but not through complementary therapies.  The best way to get involved is by looking at the site and to use it as a forum to exchange ideas. We have tried to avoid making any claims about curing or treating cancer with complimentary therapies. Support is the key word and it’s a broad church approach.

If you want to be involved please contact us. The site itself is community based and all participants have a level of access and input determined by how much involvement they wish to have.