“We just want to celebrate her and how important she was in all of our lives"

The heartbroken friend of a young Beamore woman who passed away suddenly less than two years after being diagnosed with a rare disease has helped to set up a musical themed fundraiser in honour of her pal who loved the West End to mark what would have been her 36th birthday.

On the 3rd December 2020, Claire Lynch lost her friend Emily O'Reilly to an illness known as Aplastic Anaemia , a serious condition affecting the blood, where the bone marrow and stem cells do not produce enough blood cells.

Over two years with incomparable positivity and unwavering strength of character, Emily the daughter of Tom and Rosemary O'Reilly lived with the illness but continued her zest for life with laughter, enthusiasm, concern for others and lots and lots of musicals.

To help raise funds for The Anthony Nolan Trust and the Aplastic Anaemia Trust on what would have been Emily’s 36th Birthday on April 11th, Emily’s family and friends - Claire lynch and Niamh Cannon are inviting anyone to join them and support “Emily’s Wicked walk to the West End” over the weekend of the 9th-11th April.

The plan is to complete a virtual walk from Emily’s home in Beamore to her favourite place, the West End in London totalling 638km.

Speaking on why it was so important for Emily’s loved ones to organise a fundraiser. Claire said:

“We wanted to do something that represented Emily and when any of us started talking about her after she passed away the first thing that we would mention is her love of musicals, theatres and shows.

“Wicked was her absolute favourite musical, she must have seen it a dozen times or more.

“She studied applied music in Dundalk. As a child she played so many instruments and she joined the Drogheda Brass Band, she was very gifted.

“She moved to London and started working for Yahoo in their marketing department, she enjoyed it but her office was on Shaftsbury Avenue in the middle of the Westend and that was more exciting than the job being in the middle of it all and seeing all of the performances, she went to every show.

“Before she died she had just finally got a job that she absolutely loved with the Royal Opera House and she was so delighted to be there.”

Describing her journey with the illness, Claire said:

“Emily realised she was getting out of breath quite easily doing short walks and her investigating that led to her diagnosis in March 2019.

“She was treated in St George’s Hospital in London and she was really happy with care she had there.

“In the end her doctor said that the best thing would be for a stem cell transplant and that would be potentially a full cure all going to plan.

“They tested her siblings and it was Hugo that was a full match for the transplant. Hugo lives in Singapore so he came over to London in March of last year just before lockdown started.

“Unfortunately that one failed and she ended up being in isolation in hospital for about three months.

“Doctors said they’d try another stem cell transplant and the Anthony Nolan Trust is an organisation that really helped Emily.

“Hugo wasn’t able to travel again in May, the world had gone into lockdown so they arranged for his stem cells to be collected from him in Singapore and they couriered them to London and Emily was infused with the stem cells within 48 hours of them being drawn from Hugo.

“Anthony Nolan funded that and without them she really wouldn’t have had a chance, we really appreciate what they did for her.”

The transplant initially seemed to be successful according to Claire who met Emily on their first day of primary school in Mount Hanover N.S near Duleek.

“Everything seemed to be going in the right direction, all of her blood counts started improving but it wasn’t one hundred percent and the doctor decided they would try her on this new drug just to see if that would give a boost to her system and he said it would probably take three months to know if it worked.

“When she started the new drug in October she came home to Ireland at the beginning of November.

“She was home for a month before she died and she was so happy to be home.

“She was being monitored in St James’s Hospital and they were happy with how she was going.

“She was in hospital for a check up on the Tuesday and there were no issues and she began to feel unwell on Wednesday and she passed away on Thursday morning so it was very quick.

“It was devastating but also so shocking because it was so unexpected.

“Although she was very ill she was so positive. She did every bit of research she could on the condition, she wanted to know everything and make sure she was doing absolutely everything she could do. If the doctor told her to do XYZ she’d do exactly that.

“We just want to celebrate her and how important she was in all of our lives.

“She is missed so much by her parents and sister Clodagh, brothers Myles and Hugo and sisters in law, Copal and Sul.

“She now has a niece Lara who was born to Myles and Copal mid March, it’s so sad she will never meet her but I’m sure Lara will know all about her aunt Emily.”

Emily’s friends are asking everyone to complete a 5km walk at any time, on any of the days, over the weekend of the 9th – 11th April and make a donation to the GoFundMe page. The theme is Emily's favourite musical Wicked so they are encouraging participants to wear green while getting those steps & Kms in.