At just 16, Abbie Ledger’s world was turned upside down when she was diagnosed with MEN1 – a rare genetic condition which mainly affects the endocrine glands and can cause tumours throughout the body.

“Being a teenager is tricky enough, but the diagnosis really shook me,” says Abbie, now 21, from Alderney. “Despite MEN1 being a genetic condition, neither of my parents had been diagnosed, and I’d never even heard of it before. Even the doctors seemed surprised by what it was.”

After months of tests, in 2020 doctors revealed Abbie had tumours in both her brain and pancreas, with the latter confirmed as cancerous . New Feature

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“I was devastated. I just wanted to be a normal teenager with my friends, doing the things I loved, like making

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