On May 28, 1998, while ill with chronic myeloid leukaemia, Karen Morris wrote down her memories of her diagnosis eight months earlier: “I remember saying at the time that if I was to die (which I wasn’t but if I was) I know I will have led a full and active life and on the whole a very happy one, short though it may be. In the last 22 years I have managed to live in three countries, met dozens of fascinating people, been able to do the type of work that I believe in (although lucrative — it wasn’t!), built up a beautiful set of friends and have very close, loving relationships with my family. But perhaps most importantly I have finally got to the stage where I like the person that I have become.”
Less than four months later, two days before Rosh Hashanah, Karen passed away. She was 23. Tomorrow — September 18, 2021 — will be a significant milestone, particularly for Karen’s family and close friends. “It will be 23 years, three months and 20 days since she died. It will be the day that Karen will have left us longer than she was with us.” says Karen’s mum, Sylvia, from her home in Cambridge.
To mark this date, Sylvia came up with the 23 Challenge for Karen. It calls on people to do something connected to the number 23 in a bid to raise collective funds of £23,000 for the Karen Morris Memorial Trust (KMMT), set up in the aftermath of Karen’s untimely death.
KMMT funds Karen’s Homes from Homes at hospitals across the UK for patients who are undergoing treatment for leukaemia and their families. So far, they have managed to open a Karen’s Home from Home in four hospitals — at Hammersmith Hospital, where Karen received her treatment, Addenbrooke’s in Cambridge, the Churchill in Oxford and the Queen Elizabeth in Birmingham, and discussions are underway for a fifth home at another leading haematology department. “We were lucky,” recalls Sylvia, who used to live in Woodside Park. “If Karen could come home for a few hours or for a weekend, we were only 12 miles away, but I would say that 80 per cent of patients, if not more, couldn’t go home because of where they lived. There were people from the Middle East, from Greece and from Scotland while Karen was in. There was very institutional accommodation across the road that people had to share.”
The emphasis is very much on the “home from home”. The flats are tastefully decorated with fully equipped kitchens “so very often, the patient’s relation or friend will cook their favourite meals and take them in,” says Sylvia, 75, who is chair of KMMT. “Treatment for leukaemia is a long process so it helps to have a family member, a friendly face, with you.”
Extraordinarily, it was Karen herself who first started the fundraising efforts for leukaemia shortly after her diagnosis. Contacting the Sue Harris Trust, Karen was asked to front their campaign for more Jewish people to join the bone marrow register. “That Yom Kippur, in synagogues throughout the UK, there was a leaflet with Karen’s face on it. It resulted in thousands joining the bone marrow register and thousands of pounds being raised,” remembers Sylvia.
The following March, Karen, who had by then decided that she wanted to have a career raising the profile of leukaemia, started fundraising for Leuka 2000, now part of Leukaemia UK. “I remember we had a brainstorming session when Karen was alive. There were all sorts of people there and Karen was saying: ‘Well, what are you going to do? What are you going to do?’ I remember it well.” Money raised went towards a day room at the Hammersmith Hospital.
As well as being determined and compassionate, Karen was also someone who worked hard and played hard, says her mother, who used to work for the Reform Beth Din and Leo Baeck College. “A friend said that Karen was almost disappointed when she finished an essay at university because she loved studying, and at the same time, she was extremely popular and had a large circle of friends. Every Saturday at 6 o’clock, everybody would be phoning her, asking what they were going to do that evening.”
Karen’s younger sister, Debby Jepps, 44, who is secretary of KMMT, remembers Karen as “a very protective big sister. Even though she was always smaller than me, she was someone I was able to look up to because she was so smart. She was far more interested in making positive changes than earning any money. We laughed about how she never got herself a proper job.”
Karen was just starting her fourth year of a French and History degree at Warwick University when she received her diagnosis. Both her studies and her youth leadership with RSY Netzer, which she was passionate about, had to be abandoned as her illness progressed.
Recalling her sister’s final year, Debby says: “As horrible as [that time] was, there was also something so beautiful about it. Even though she had many friends, she pulled me and Mum close and it was us that she wanted with her all the time.” When Karen was in hospital, Debby would come down from Manchester University every weekend and sleep on a chair next to Karen’s bed. The sisters managed to have “a really special” weekend together in Paris before Karen died.
Debby, a teaching assistant, who lives close to her mum, says she keeps her emotions “in a box” but that it pains her greatly that her three children never got to meet their aunt. “My daughter’s middle name is Karen, which she tells everybody at any opportunity, and we talk a lot about her, partly because of the charity.”
Sylvia says that lifecycle events, such as Debby’s wedding and the arrival of her grandchildren were especially hard without Karen. She describes her work with KMMT as a type of “occupational therapy”, and with income for the charity down about 40 per cent due to Covid, her push to raise funds is greater than ever.
When the London Marathon was cancelled last year, KMMT joined the 2.6 Challenge, which saw Debby’s teenage son Zac run a mile in 26 layers of clothing. The hope is that people will take on The 23 Challenge for Karen in the same creative and fun spirit. “The choices are limitless,” says Sylvia, who is doing a daily mile for 23 days. “You could sell 23 cupcakes, invite 23 friends over for breakfast and ask them to make a donation or climb 23 stairs for 23 days. I’m sure if Karen was here, she would come up with all sorts of original ideas.”
Hoping that enough funds will be raised for a fifth Karen’s Home from Home in 2024, Sylvia admits that the opening of each home brings with it “very mixed” emotions. “Treatment for leukaemia patients has come on leaps and bounds in the last 23 years, yet I still know what could be ahead for these patients. At the same time, Karen’s name lives on and it gives some meaning to our loss.”
For more information on the 23 Challenge for Karen, email: info@kmmt.org.uk or visit: kmmt.org.uk and click on “Support Us”. To sponsor Sylvia, go to: uk.virginmoneygiving.com/SylviaMorris4
