By Alesha Capone
Hoppers Crossing resident Carla says that her love of the Demons helped her get through treatment for breast cancer.
Carla said the while she was undergoing chemotherapy in 2000, she simply felt she could not keep going on a physical and emotional level.
However, Carla’s oncologist gave her some advice: to take everything on a week-by-week basis, much like a football team does.
The oncologist told Carla that if Melbourne won their next game, she had to attend her next chemotherapy appointment.
“They won the game, then they continued winning all bloody season and they made the grand final,” Carla said.
Carla said that she was inspired by Melbourne players who underwent multiple knee reconstructions but returned to the game, and others such as Jesse Hogan who played a week after losing his father to cancer.
“They give people like me hope and that’s why I love them,” Carla said.
In the lead-up to this year’s grand final, Carla has decorated her family’s lounge room with Demons scarves from the past 20 years.
“The first thing I did when my husband walked out was buy a Melbourne membership and I have never looked back since,” she said.
She also purchased Melbourne memberships for all her nieces and nephews when they were born.
Carla said she had hoped lockdown would be over in time for her to travel interstate to see the 2021 grand final, and that she had been saving money to pay for her time in quarantine.
“I would have given anything to have gone,” she said.
“Hopefully we’ll do a back-to-back and next year’s grand final will be in Melbourne.”
