Birmingham mum stranded in Cyprus while daughter has emergency brain surgery
Apr 23 2010 by Sophie Cross, Birmingham Mail
A DEVASTATED Birmingham mother told of her heartache at being stranded in Cyprus as her daughter had emergency surgery to remove a brain tumour.
Carole Chrysanthou, from Hall Green, said she could not sleep at night for thinking about her daughter, Sophia Green, who underwent an operation to remove the growth yesterday.
The 65-year-old and her husband Michael could not be at her bedside after being left stranded by the grounding of all flights by the ash cloud.
Now they hope to buy one-way tickets home with the lifting of restrictions on air travel after 43-year-old Sophia broke the news of her condition by telephone during their holiday.
Carole said: “I went to the airport within the hour when Sophia told me last Friday. It was deserted and they told me to come back this week. I spent all day there on Monday but then they told me to come back on May 3.
“I was so relieved to hear they had started to open the airports. I’m going to buy a ticket back as soon as I can.”
Nursery nurse Sophia, a mum of three daughters, began suffering severe migraines a year ago but was initially advised by doctors to take painkillers.
Carole said: “She had trouble with her eyesight and couldn’t concentrate.
“At first I thought she was having a nervous breakdown. Then she started getting numb down one side of her body, but she never wanted to make a fuss, she thought it was a trapped nerve.”
Hospital tests finally revealed a tumour was putting pressure on her brain. Carole had been in Larnaca, where 69-year-old Michael has family, for five weeks when Sophia telephoned them to break the news.
She was broken-hearted to discover that, as her return flight was booked for the end of May, she would be unable to transfer her ticket as passengers whose flight dates had passed were being given priority. Sophia’s three teenage daughters and husband, Roger, have been with her every day at Walsgrave Hospital Coventry.
