Lisa Moss - a tribute

Lisa Moss - what can I say about this remarkable young lady?

We both started work within a week of each other and as she had seven days worth of knowledge over me - she showed me where to go and get my pass, she showed me how to log into my PC account and generally helped me through my first week at a new work place.

She was a gem. Always laughing, always making me smile and as you can imagine, we hit it off straight away.

When she got promotion to the job of events manager, our paths crossed more as we worked in the same offices and used to work long hours, especially when we were working on the same events.

Poor Lisa was also subject to some of my terrible practical jokes and I often used to tease her for how easy she was to fall for my pranks. She took them all in good faith and we'd often giggle about the sillier things in life.

We both had an unhealthy obsession with Holby City and used to spend our tea breaks or chats in between walking to meetings catching up with the latest news at Holby.

Lisa didn't know just how funny she was. Her natural flair for saying things that had us all in stitches was legendary. Her sat nav in the car broke and she came into the office one morning extremely flustered as it was no longer working. "I'm just lost without my sat nav" she piped up. Not realising why we laughed at her comment.

Then things changed. One day when we were just having a chat in the office, she mentioned to me about a lump she had discovered and that was the day that her life took a totally different direction.

Finding a lump is something a woman fears most and after she'd had it checked out and it was confirmed that it was cancer - Lisa went into her warrior mode. She was not going to let this awful disease get the better of her. She was going to fight it - no matter what. And fight it she did.

She went through the pain of surgery, chemotherapy and all that comes with it to emerge the other end, smiling and laughing at the different wigs she had to wear to conceal the fact that her hair had gone.

Not once in my company did she complain. We both had crying sessions when I hugged her and let her sob on my shoulder and she had the odd pangs of "why me" but everyone does - but she coped with it in her stride and we were delighted when she announced that this life-threatening illness had given her a new zest for life.

She took out her savings, learned to salsa dance in Cuba, went to and took part in the Rio Carnival, visited Bangkok, Thailand, Spain and went on various cruises - life had dealt her a blow but she was going to enjoy as much as she could.

We were all delighted when after more surgery and a double reconstruction, she was back at work but her good fortune was not to last and the illness returned with an even more aggressive streak.

The brave Lisa battled on; determined that she would once again beat it. After a year of constant treatment, stays in hospital, chemo-therapy, blood transfusions and endless trips to the consultant - she got the news that she was not going to get better and that body blow saw her deteriorate so quickly.

She passed away on 12 May with her family and friends at her bedside.

Thirty seven years old is no age to die. She had so much more to do with her life, things she wanted to see, people she wanted to meet but she was so cruelly robbed of those chances.

I only knew Lisa for five years but in those five years, she was one of the kindest, nicest and most precious friends to have.

Although my last memory of her was as she lay in her hospital bed on Tuesday, I'm hoping that in time, the image you see in my blog is the one that comes to mind when I think about her - smiling, happy, vivacious and stunning.

She was my friend, my colleague and a true inspiration.

Rest in peace my beautiful girl. I'm going to miss you so very, very much.

xxx