Who is Emma?

Hi, I’m Tamra, Emma’s mum. Unfortunately, this heading should now read ‘Who was Emma?’ as Emma passed away in April 2017. As you can imagine, it’s been hard to come to terms with Emma’s death, and I’m not quite ready to make this change. Down the track I may change the heading to the past tense. But in the meantime, Emma’s introduction will remain as she wrote it. 

So let’s start again. Who is Emma? 

Well, that’d be me! I’m Emma Betts, a 25-year-old Pavlova baking, cavoodle loving, former aid-worker from Brisbane, Australia. I’m also the author of the blog, Dear Melanoma. What else? I studied International Relations and Peace and Conflict Studies at university with a strong passion for aid and development. At the age of 21, I ventured to East Timor where I worked for a year and lived the exciting (but not always glamorous) expat life. At the age of 22 I found my great love – Serge - and married him six-months later. Serge and I live a loved-up life with our beautiful fur-baby Ralph the Cavoodle.

I also happen to be living with terminal cancer. In 2013 at just 22-years-old, I was diagnosed with Stage 4 Metastatic Melanoma. It was a terminal prognosis and I was given just three months to live. On the positive (!!), I was lucky enough to gain access to a clinical trial and was granted time to make memories with Serge, my family and friends. Almost two years on, I am now facing another hurdle of not only finding a new treatment but also one that works ASAP.

My days are spent writing my Dear Melanoma blog (which has attracted a beautiful community of over 25,000 followers), hosting fundraising events and running this – my new business - Love, Emma. I also tour the country giving talks to schools and community groups on sun safety and melanoma research.

My husband Leon and I have taken over the reins of Emma's blog Dear Melanoma and her care package business Love, Emma. And we are pleased to announce, that going forward all profits from Love, Emma will be donated to fund cancer research in Emma's honour.

If you have any questions or comments for me – drop me a line via the contact page and thanks for stopping by.

Tamra