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Stephen Sutton dies: an uplifting life that inspired millions
Mother says goodbye to terminally-ill 19-year-old with bowel cancer, who raised £3.34m for Teenage Cancer Trust
Stephen Sutton, who died on Wednesday, after being re-admitted to hospital on Sunday. Photograph: Stephen's Story/Facebook/PA
Few scenarios can seem as cruel or as bleak as a 19-year-old boy dying of cancer. And yet, in the case of Stephen Sutton,
who died peacefully in his sleep in the early hours of Wednesday
morning, it became an inspiring, uplifting tale for millions of people.
Sutton was already something of a local hero in Birmingham, where he was being treated, but it was an extraordinary Facebook update in April that catapulted him into the national spotlight.
"It's a final thumbs up from me," he wrote, accompanied by a selfie of him lying in a sickbed, covered in drips, smiling cheerfully with his thumbs in the air. "I've done well to blag things as well as I have up till now, but unfortunately I think this is just one hurdle too far."
It was an extraordinary moment: many would have forgiven him being full of rage and misery. And yet here was a simple, understated display of cheerful defiance.
Sutton had originally set a fundraising target of £10,000 for the Teenage Cancer Trust. But the emotional impact of that selfie was so profound that, in a matter of days, more than £3m was donated.
He made a temporary recovery that baffled doctors; he explained that he had "coughed up" a tumour. And so began an extraordinary dialogue with his well-wishers.
To his astonishment, nearly a million people liked his Facebook page and tens of thousands followed him on Twitter. It is fashionable to be downbeat about social media: to dismiss it as being riddled with the banal and the narcissistic, or for stripping human interaction of warmth as conversations shift away from the "real world" to the online sphere.
But it was difficult not to be moved by the online response to Stephen's story: a national wave of emotion that is not normally forthcoming for those outside the world of celebrity.
His social-media updates were relentlessly upbeat, putting those of us who have tweeted moaning about a cold to shame. "Just another update to let everyone know I am still doing and feeling very well," he reassured followers less than a week before his death. "My disease is very advanced and will get me eventually, but I will try my damn hardest to be here as long as possible."
Sutton was diagnosed with bowel cancer in September 2010 when he was 15; tragically, he had been misdiagnosed and treated for constipation months earlier.
But his response was unabashed positivity from the very beginning, even describing his diagnosis as a "good thing" and a "kick up the backside".
The day he began chemotherapy, he attended a party dressed as a granny – he was so thin and pale, he said, that he was "quite convincing". He refused to take time off school, where he excelled.
When he was diagnosed as terminally ill two years later, he set up a Facebook page with a bucket list of things he wanted to achieve, including sky-diving, crowd-surfing in a rubber dinghy, and hugging an animal bigger than him (an elephant, it turned out).
But it was his fundraising for cancer research that became his passion, and his efforts will undoubtedly transform the lives of some of the 2,200 teenagers and young adults diagnosed with cancer each year.
The Teenage Cancer Trust on Wednesday said it was humbled and hugely grateful for his efforts, with donations still ticking up and reaching £3.34m by mid-afternoon .
His dream had been to become a doctor. With that ambition taken from him, he sought and found new ways to help people. "Spreading positivity" was another key aim. Four days ago, he organised a National Good Gestures Day, in Birmingham, giving out "free high-fives, hugs, handshakes and fist bumps".
Indeed, it was not just money for cancer research that Sutton was after. He became an evangelist for a new approach to life.
"I don't see the point in measuring life in time any more," he told one crowd. "I would rather measure it in terms of what I actually achieve. I'd rather measure it in terms of making a difference, which I think is a much more valid and pragmatic measure."
By such a measure, Sutton could scarcely have lived a longer, richer and more fulfilling life.
Celebrities were among those who were captivated by Sutton. The comedian Jason Manford championed Sutton's fundraising, putting on a gig that sold out within four minutes. "It's been the most life affirming week of my life," Manford tweeted me at the end of April. "That boy deserves the world."
Entertainers including Ricky Gervais and Benedict Cumberbatch cheered him on. David Cameron visited him in hospital.
"The reason we took to him so passionately was because he was better than us, he did something that none of us could even imagine doing," Manford said in a statement on Wednesday. "In his darkest hour, he selflessly dedicated his final moments to raising millions of pounds for teenagers with cancer."
Others paying tribute included Clare Balding, Barry Manilow and Kevin Pietersen.
In his last few weeks, Sutton was a star-struck teenager, unable to process the outpouring of emotion and compassion that he had triggered. He did not want to die, but his thirst for life did not manifest itself in gloomy or depressing ways.
"Cancer sucks, but life is great," was his motto.
Announcing Stephen's death, his mother wrote that "her heart is bursting with pride but breaking with pain for my courageous, selfless, inspirational son", and that the "ongoing support and outpouring of love for Stephen will help greatly at this difficult time, in the same way as it helped Stephen throughout his journey".
Her pride undoubtedly has much to do with the fact that cancer never defeated Sutton, even though it took his life. He will not just be remembered for his fundraising or his refusal to be defined by his cancer. He inspired people to embrace life, regardless of the obstacles, to be full of compassion, and to look after each other. That is quite a legacy for a 19-year-old boy from Burntwood in Staffordshire.
Sutton was already something of a local hero in Birmingham, where he was being treated, but it was an extraordinary Facebook update in April that catapulted him into the national spotlight.
"It's a final thumbs up from me," he wrote, accompanied by a selfie of him lying in a sickbed, covered in drips, smiling cheerfully with his thumbs in the air. "I've done well to blag things as well as I have up till now, but unfortunately I think this is just one hurdle too far."
It was an extraordinary moment: many would have forgiven him being full of rage and misery. And yet here was a simple, understated display of cheerful defiance.
Sutton had originally set a fundraising target of £10,000 for the Teenage Cancer Trust. But the emotional impact of that selfie was so profound that, in a matter of days, more than £3m was donated.
He made a temporary recovery that baffled doctors; he explained that he had "coughed up" a tumour. And so began an extraordinary dialogue with his well-wishers.
To his astonishment, nearly a million people liked his Facebook page and tens of thousands followed him on Twitter. It is fashionable to be downbeat about social media: to dismiss it as being riddled with the banal and the narcissistic, or for stripping human interaction of warmth as conversations shift away from the "real world" to the online sphere.
But it was difficult not to be moved by the online response to Stephen's story: a national wave of emotion that is not normally forthcoming for those outside the world of celebrity.
His social-media updates were relentlessly upbeat, putting those of us who have tweeted moaning about a cold to shame. "Just another update to let everyone know I am still doing and feeling very well," he reassured followers less than a week before his death. "My disease is very advanced and will get me eventually, but I will try my damn hardest to be here as long as possible."
Sutton was diagnosed with bowel cancer in September 2010 when he was 15; tragically, he had been misdiagnosed and treated for constipation months earlier.
But his response was unabashed positivity from the very beginning, even describing his diagnosis as a "good thing" and a "kick up the backside".
The day he began chemotherapy, he attended a party dressed as a granny – he was so thin and pale, he said, that he was "quite convincing". He refused to take time off school, where he excelled.
When he was diagnosed as terminally ill two years later, he set up a Facebook page with a bucket list of things he wanted to achieve, including sky-diving, crowd-surfing in a rubber dinghy, and hugging an animal bigger than him (an elephant, it turned out).
But it was his fundraising for cancer research that became his passion, and his efforts will undoubtedly transform the lives of some of the 2,200 teenagers and young adults diagnosed with cancer each year.
The Teenage Cancer Trust on Wednesday said it was humbled and hugely grateful for his efforts, with donations still ticking up and reaching £3.34m by mid-afternoon .
His dream had been to become a doctor. With that ambition taken from him, he sought and found new ways to help people. "Spreading positivity" was another key aim. Four days ago, he organised a National Good Gestures Day, in Birmingham, giving out "free high-fives, hugs, handshakes and fist bumps".
Indeed, it was not just money for cancer research that Sutton was after. He became an evangelist for a new approach to life.
"I don't see the point in measuring life in time any more," he told one crowd. "I would rather measure it in terms of what I actually achieve. I'd rather measure it in terms of making a difference, which I think is a much more valid and pragmatic measure."
By such a measure, Sutton could scarcely have lived a longer, richer and more fulfilling life.
Celebrities were among those who were captivated by Sutton. The comedian Jason Manford championed Sutton's fundraising, putting on a gig that sold out within four minutes. "It's been the most life affirming week of my life," Manford tweeted me at the end of April. "That boy deserves the world."
Entertainers including Ricky Gervais and Benedict Cumberbatch cheered him on. David Cameron visited him in hospital.
"The reason we took to him so passionately was because he was better than us, he did something that none of us could even imagine doing," Manford said in a statement on Wednesday. "In his darkest hour, he selflessly dedicated his final moments to raising millions of pounds for teenagers with cancer."
Others paying tribute included Clare Balding, Barry Manilow and Kevin Pietersen.
In his last few weeks, Sutton was a star-struck teenager, unable to process the outpouring of emotion and compassion that he had triggered. He did not want to die, but his thirst for life did not manifest itself in gloomy or depressing ways.
"Cancer sucks, but life is great," was his motto.
Announcing Stephen's death, his mother wrote that "her heart is bursting with pride but breaking with pain for my courageous, selfless, inspirational son", and that the "ongoing support and outpouring of love for Stephen will help greatly at this difficult time, in the same way as it helped Stephen throughout his journey".
Her pride undoubtedly has much to do with the fact that cancer never defeated Sutton, even though it took his life. He will not just be remembered for his fundraising or his refusal to be defined by his cancer. He inspired people to embrace life, regardless of the obstacles, to be full of compassion, and to look after each other. That is quite a legacy for a 19-year-old boy from Burntwood in Staffordshire.
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