Elliot rings the bell

In 2017, I first wrote about Elliot and her cancer battle. I wrote about her again in 2018. Last week, I watched as Elliot ‘rang the bell’ to mark the end of eight and a half years of cancer treatment.

The weather is awful. It’s one of those typical Pōneke days where it’s pouring with rain but you’re just glad it’s not windy too. As we all trickle into the oncology ward on level three of the children’s hospital we shed raincoats and jackets.

As soon as my raincoat is off, Elliot is in my arms. Here’s one thing you need to know about Elliot Maria Win Beech: She is such a good hugger. She throws herself at you, she touches your face gently, she presses her forehead against yours, she hugs you like nobody is more deserving of a hug than you.

Here’s something else to know about Elliot - Elliot was born on Tuesday the 26 January at 4.20pm. Three months later, her mother Caroline noticed a shake in her right eye. Two months after that, an MRI revealed a tumour in her brain. Elliot was just five months old when her cancer journey began.

She was just six months old when a port-a-cath inserted into the side of her chest began to pump chemotherapy into her largest and strongest vein, just above her heart.

She has had 52 rounds of intravenous chemotherapy in her first year of treatment, followed by seven-and-a-half years of oral chemotherapy.

On 4th April, 2025, she will get to ring the bell located on the oncology ward that marks the end of active treatment.

Officially now in ‘surveillance’ for the next three years, it is not the end of Elliot’s cancer battle. But today, we’re celebrating Elliot.

On the wall is a bell with a long white rope. It has a poem printed next to it, with a rainbow.

Ring this bell
Three times well
Its toll to clearly say,
My treatment’s done
This course is run
And I am on my way!

The treatment room is packed. Elliot’s mum’s eyes are red already and we laugh that we’ve both already cried this morning. There’s a nervous energy. Everyone is delighted for Elliot but there is a lot of emotion in this room.

Elliot runs back and forth, her leg brace barely slowing her down. She can’t wait to ring the bell.

Ever since her tumour was found, Elliot has fought hard. She had drugs that made her dizzy and fatigued, drugs that made her hair curl like a Raphaelite cherub, drugs that made her vomit for days and days, drugs that caused her hair to fall out, that made her skin break out with rashes and sores…

The drugs fight the tumour that spreads across four areas of her brain. She would go blind if the cancer was left unchecked as it is around the optic nerve, the optic chiasm, the thalamus and the hypothalamus (control centre for appetite, weight, temperature, balance, gross motor control, and hormone regulation). The tumour has caused hypothalamic obesity and low vision.

There is often little to celebrate when it comes to cancer like Elliot’s. And in the last five years, the Baker-Beech family has been hit with a deeply unfair blow. Elliot’s dad, Jarrod, has also been fighting cancer.

Lina says they’re accepting of the hand they’ve been dealt as a family, no matter how hard it is.

“We used to talk a lot about the concept of ‘out of the woods’,” she says. “And how we actually just live in the forest now, amongst the birds, the weta, the ruru, all the creatures, with the other bush families here - we live in the forest now, and that's okay - this is our normal.”

“Jarrod's diagnosis has been awful but he is supported by the community, and feels like it fits with the ‘living in the woods’ theme".

But today, we’re celebrating.

Elliot is impatient to ring the bell. She’s waited for this day for so long. She never expected this day would come so soon. She wants this. She rings it early, causing an eruption of laughter. Everyone in this room loves Elliot.

Outside of this room, Elliot is dearly loved. To be honest, she’s almost a celebrity. In my family we often share ‘Elliot-isms’ - hilarious things Elliot has said to us. She is wildly confident, hilarious, and outgoing.

She wants to be friends with everyone she meets - and everyone wants to be friends with Elliot. When I mention her, people know exactly who she is. From zooming around in her wheelchair to now confidently running with a brace - she’s always keen for a hug and a chat. She will often ask strangers if they want to have a playdate - because everyone is a potential friend to Elliot.

Elliot’s parents share their thanks for the community as they stand with Elliot by the bell. One of her first nurses has FaceTimed in, the other stands by her side.

Elliot’s grandparents speak, as does her Tuakana. A family friend who has been through a harrowing cancer journey - whose child did not survive, has travelled from Tāmaki Makaurau to be here today.

Then it’s time.

Elliot rings the bell.

As we all clap for Elliot and her whānau, she dances around the room, her eyes skyward, her hands outstretched as if to say: “Are you ready world?”.

Her parents reach for each other and tenderly hug. They have been through what is unimaginable for most parents - and the future is unclear. Lydia, their eldest child, comes in for a cuddle. They’ve been given a Mecca voucher by their aunty to honour their role in being the best big sister Elliot could ever have.

Lydia, at 12, is often volunteering to support children with cancer and their siblings. Caroline is on the organising committee of the Child Cancer Whanau Connect Group for Wellington.

Everyone in the family works to support the club that nobody wants to be part of. Some of those present know them from this support. They’re beyond grateful - their tears speak for them.

Jarrod says later, “It’s scary in a way - we’re all taking a big leap into the unknown. We don’t know which of the challenges she’s had to date are because of her cancer and which are to do with her treatment,” he pauses. “...or the extent to which both things have contributed to making her the amazing person she is today.”

“We do know that the challenges aren’t over, even if the treatment is - but whatever they are we’ll face them as a family and as part of an incredible community.”

These aren’t ripples. Because Cancer isn’t a rock thrown into a calm lake. It’s a landslide into a tsunami. But there are stories like this one that show that there is courage like no other in the aftermath. There are so many selfless acts of love.

Today, the bell rang clear and true.

It rang for Elliot. For Lydia. For Jarrod. For Caroline. For Elliot’s family and Elliot’s loved ones.

It also rang for the oncologists, the nurses, the specialists, the therapists, the taxpayers whose tax pays for the medication that has kept Elliot alive.

It rang for every family that will never get to hear it.

It rang for every child and their loving parents who wish to hear it.

It rang for community and heart and hope and joy.

In every ring it said: This is courage.

And Elliot kept dancing.

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