'Sassy' Hartlepool three-year-old's pains and bruises turned out to be leukaemia
A three-year-old girl from Hartlepool is putting up a fight after being diagnosed with a rare type of cancer.
Amelia McKie, from Hartlepool, was diagnosed with Acute Lymphoblastic Leukaemia (ALL) just weeks after her third birthday in September.
It thought only around 790 people in the UK are diagnosed with the condition each year.
Amelia's parents became concerned after she was feeling constantly tired, having not previously been a napper, getting pains in her legs and being covered in bruises up her spine.
After googling Amelia's symptoms, her mum Sam Hunter, 24, became worried that results were suggesting leukaemia.
Ms Hunter called her doctors surgery Chadwick Practice to get a professional opinion and was advised to take her three-year-old to North Tees A&E.
Ms Hunter said: "I was like this is all very strange, but when it was stuff that was individual like tiredness, I just thought maybe she's got a bit of a flu or a bit of a cold, and with the bruising you think maybe she fell over.
"I mean she was in with the five-year-olds [at nursery] so you think maybe she's just has a little fall or something and nobody's noticed, you just write it all off.
"Then there was things like temperatures during the night and she would wake up screaming and she was like 39.5 degrees and we thought what on earth.
"But at that temperature for a normal child, it's 111, paracetamol job, watch and wait.
"We were putting her in a cool bath - but we were treating what turned out to be leukaemia with cool baths, which looking back now we laugh at."
Ms Hunter picked Amelia up from Little Treasures Nursery in Hartlepool and rushed her to the hospital, an experience she described as "like a blur".
Tests revealed that Amelia's white blood cell count was just 70, a drastic difference from the usual range of 5,000 - 10,000.
These results all but confirmed suspicions of cancer, however Ms Hunter was told to pack a bag and take her daughter through to Newcastle's Royal Victoria Infirmary where they would be able to give a full diagnosis.
The news was shocking, and even more so considering the day before, Ms Hunter had just discovered that she and her partner Karl Williamson, 24, were expecting their first child together - and that Amelia was going to be a big sister.
Ms Hunter said: "We were just in this bizarre world sat in A&E with this child - who is quite well in herself at this point and making a mess of their playroom - and we're sat here streaming with tears while the doctor tells us [she has cancer]."I'm just looking at this child that looks perfectly well in front of me, that's my little girl, and you just don't know what the future holds anymore. Nothing can prepare you for it."
Despite the shock diagnosis Amelia's mum said she has not been phased by the constant doctors and hospitals.
She added: "She's not frightened of anyone, then you take her into a whole new environment [at the hospital] which was for two and a half weeks at first and we thought this is going to be horrendous.
"But every new person she meets, she'll just say 'what's your name' and 'how many are you' meaning how old are you, 'what do you do here' and 'are you a doctor' - and she's still like that now."
Amelia is currently on a clinical trial called ALL together, a study aiming to improve survival and quality of survival for children and young adults with ALL.
The family now travels to Newcastle's Royal Victoria Infirmary (RVI) once a week so she can have chemotherapy.
Her treatment is set to continue for the next two and a half years, but the three-year-old's prognosis is good and her family are confident that she will remain her "sassy and stubborn" self.
Want a quick and expert briefing on the biggest news stories? Listen to our latest podcasts to find out What You Need To know...