Generous well-wishers have raised almost £2,500 to help a mother with terminal cancer pay for funeral costs and a memorial bench.

Mandy Lane, who is from Senacre in Maidstone, is being cared for by the Heart of Kent Hospice after chemotherapy earlier this year failed to successfully defeat the cancer in her neck and mouth.

Because the 49-year-old has suffered with a lung condition since 2005 she has struggled to get life insurance, and she is determined not to leave husband Peter and their teenage daughter Jess burdened financially because of funeral costs.

The family also hope that they will be able to remember Mrs Lane with a memorial bench at the Dungeness station of the Romney, Hythe and Dymchurch Railway, a day out the couple always enjoyed taking together.

So far the family's crowdfunding appeal has raised almost £2,500 via a Go Fund Me page.

Mr Lane, a 56-year-old who works at an electrical distributors, says he has been taken aback by the generosity that friends, family and other well-wishers have shown them.

He said: "At the start of Covid, March last year, she was diagnosed with head and neck cancer, they were reluctant to do an operation at the time and she had radiotherapy instead.

"That did not work, and then they decided on an operation which they did in October last year, which again did not work. They did chemotherapy in February this year, which again has not worked, so we are in the situation where it's terminal.

"Unfortunately she could not get life insurance, so she is desperate to pay for her own funeral.

"I would have found the money, but she wants to pay for it and do everything herself so I can concentrate, when the time comes, on looking after our daughter."

Mrs Lane, who has difficulty speaking for any length of time because of the location of the cancer and her treatments, says she is "very happy and very grateful" that so many people - who do not necessarily have much themselves - have given so generously.

Her husband says she is determined to make it to October in the hope she will be able to spend her 50th birthday with him, their daughter and Lola the cat.

To visit the Lanes' fundraising page, click here

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