rivers2cross

Kelly ‘Kickasskell’ Smith died of bowel cancer on June 13th, 2020. Kelly’s treatment was paused during the pandemic causing her cancer to accelerate dramatically and tragically leading to her death. She might have have had longer and precious time with her young son Finn if treatment had continued.

In memory of Kelly and with the blessing of her family I am selling kickaskell t-shirts, hoodies, snoods and teddy bears to raise money for the family’s justgiving page supporting Cancer Research UK. Kelly did a huge amount to raise awareness about bowel cancer especially for younger people fighting cancer to try and stop others going through what she did.

Kelly’s contribution to my bowel cancer fundraising book The Record was immense. Having met her on Instagram I was delighted when she agreed to take part in the book, and then again when she agreed to write what was the perfect and quite wonderful foreword for the book. Kelly’s chapter begins the section on some amazing and inspirational people from the bowel cancer community. The book was written in memory of my mum who died of bowel cancer in August 2016. All profits are donated to Bowel Cancer UK, and over £1000 has been raised to date. It’s available as a paperback, eBook and hardback. Click here to see all the ways to buy the book. I also was very honoured to bring out a music release dedicated to Kelly which also raises funds for Bowel Cancer UK. I got four different artists to record their own versions of a my original track Goodbye Farewell. The Goodbye Farewell EP has four versions of the song recorded by different artists. Carol Hodge, KirbyWalsh, Steve Webster and Jason Bradley / Mike Dlugozima. Every one involved gave up their time to be involved in the project, and the end result is quite brilliant.

I remain very grateful to Kelly and will never forget her kindness and friendship, nor her support for The Record. She was one of life’s brightest shining lights, a beautiful soul inside and out, and an amazing inspiration to many. She is greatly missed by many people x

I’d like to share Kelly’s post from May 2019 on Instagram after she’d received her copy of The Record . She put things across in true ‘kickasskell’ style.

One of my proudest moments as I go through the experience of this shitty disease!! Want to know what I have to say from the heart on the UK’s second biggest cancer killer? Want to hear my story from the beginning? Want to see lots of celebrities views on how it’s impacted their lives? From Basil Brush to Victoria Derbyshire, the legend Billy Ocean or even Jules Peters?! Hear real life stories happening right now!! Purchase this book at rivers2cross.com and ALL funds raised will be donated to Bowel Cancer UK #bowelcancer #raisingawareness #therecord Kelly Smith – May 2019

Bowel cancer claims 16,000 lives in the UK, and is the second biggest cancer killer. However if caught early at stage 1 it is very treatable, and the five year survival rate is over 90%. When detected at the late stage 4 the five year survival rate drops dramatically to 7%. This shows how crucial early diagnosis is to getting a better outcome. Knowing the symptoms is so important.