MEMORIAL CEREMONY

Tony was diagnosed with Brain Cancer in 2004, and given 12 months to live. Defying the Doctors, he lived a further 16 years . Read his story below and be inspired. For more information on Brain Cancer, and to donate to research see the Cure Brain Cancer Foundation

TONY MCDONALD…A Brain cancer warrior

“My Hero isn’t someone who has special powers or anything, but is still very special to me. My Hero is my cousin Tony.” Kaylah, age 11

A huge thank you to Tony’s wife Irma for supporting his story being shared. Tony’s memorial service was held in a local Community Hall, which had once been the local primary school, and was beautifully restored. Tributes were written by all present on the blackboard, and the community brought along food and memories to share. A very loving and moving service, and one I was very honoured to lead. I had met with Tony 2 weeks before his death, and the Eulogy I wrote (included below), was from the information he shared with me…

In Tony’s own words, “I get a lot of people saying that I’m an inspiration to others, when it’s the inspiration I get from
others that inspires me.”

MEMORIAL SERVICE FOR TONY MCDONALD

We are here today to honour the life of Tony McDonald.

It has been said that it is not the years in your life which count, but the life in your years.  When I spoke recently with Tony and Irma about his life, I was immediately struck by how much living his years had been filled with. Tony said to me “I have had a fantastic life.”  Although he lived only 52 years of time, he lived many more years in adventures.

Although those of you left behind have hearts heavy with grief it might be some comfort to reflect that while he was here he felt he had a great life. He had many and varied jobs travelled widely and enjoyed the company of the fellow travellers he met along the way. If His wattle yellow Kombi that he bought, sold, and bought and sold again could speak it would tell many an interesting tale.

Tony departs this world having given much, endured much, and enjoyed much. Today we gather to honour his name, to reflect on his life, to say goodbye, and to thank him.

On Tony’s behalf, I would like to thank you, his community of family and friends, for gathering to honour his memory. 

Your presence ensures Irma, Hayden Josh and Lukas, his parents, and all his family, feel very proud and supported at this time. Please be assured they are very grateful. We also acknowledge family and friends, from all around Australia, who are not able to be here today, but who are thinking of Tony and family at this time.

My name is Jacqueline Gray, as a celebrant and as a person, I am very honoured to have been invited to lead this service today.

You are here in respect, to reflect on Tony’s life, and to remember moments shared with him. 
I will share an overview of his life with you, followed by a few tributes.

Tony was born in Tamworth, New South Wales. He was an only child, but considered his many mates his brothers.  Tony was a social lad, and a bit of a ratbag at school. He liked to push the boundaries and challenge life a little.

But he was always a hard worker, and was driving a paper truck around the outskirt towns of Tamworth delivering papers as a young man, worked in the waterbed factory, as a Panel beater, a Spraypainter, in hospitality, gaining a broad range of life skills and experience, and the money to travel around the country.  He worked in Tamworth, Griffith and the pubs and clubs of the Gold Coast, and told me it was a busy, busy life.

In his 30’s he took off for a trip around Australia, living out of his Kombi as he went.  By the time he got to Perth he had had enough of the travelling and stopped there for a time, selling the Kombi.

Then he travelled to Alice and fell in love not just with the red open countryside, but with painting in the vibrant colours of
this sunburnt country, and… his wife to be, Irma. In Alice he used his skills to become a picture framer, and an artist.

Tony was the Landlord where Irma had been staying with friends, and Tony would turn up to water the garden. When her friends left
Alice, Tony was her sole friend in the town, and by this time, Tony was ready to settle down and start a family.  Tony had been diagnosed already with brain cancer when he met Irma.  He followed all the medical advice and determined to beat the disease, enabling himself to have 15 more years, to become a husband, and a father to 3 amazing young men, of whom he was so very proud.

Tony mentioned, also with great pride, that a hundred friends gathered in Alice Springs for his 40th, and it was obviously a very special celebration and memory for him.

Tony’s treatments meant he needed to be closer to the city hospital, and as a family they managed the Sine Cera Rainforest
Retreat in Northern New South Wales, where Tony could care for the gardens, recover from his treatments and spend quality time with his wife and children.

The family adventured to Esperence, as Irma resumed her career as a Dietician, and Tony could be a full time dad and still attend
to his medical needs.

In June last year, the family settled here in Witta, to a beautiful and tranquil location, where the boys could become a part
of a supportive community closer to family, and where Tony would spend his final days.

On Tony’s behalf and on behalf of his children and the community, I offer acknowledgement to Irma, for the care, consideration and
often extremely difficult and challenging decisions that have had to be made. Tony was only able to remain at home because of you, and have the quality of life these past years because of you. You brought great enrichment to his life.

TRIBUTES…

From Cousin Kaylah, written in 2014, when she was 11 years old, for a school project: “My Hero”

“MY HERO, TONY

“Good morning/afternoon Teachers, staff and fellow students. My hero isn’t someone who has special powers or anything but
is still very special to me. My hero is my cousin Tony.

In 2004 Tony was diagnosed with an inoperable brain tumour given only 12 months to live. Tony did a course of chemo and other
methods to try and slow the tumour down, but it continued to grow. Tony was determined to fight for his life, as he ate organic food, juices and natural healing courses and vitamins. During this time he did 6 months of chemo, doing all of this stopped the tumour from growing for 8 years.

In 2012 the tumour grew again and very fast, the symptoms got worse and tony was dying quickly. He went to Sydney to see Dr.
Charlie Teo, the world renowned neurosurgeon. On the 21st of November 2012, Tony went into surgery with a 90% chance of dying or may never speak or walk again. Dr. Teo removed a 9cm by 7cm by 9cm mass, which was pushing or creating a midline shift.

To everyone’s delight Tony lived, but had a speech problem and was paralysed down the right hand side of his body. Though Tony wasn’t going to give up. He did rehab for 18 months working hard and can now talk and walk on his own. Since then he has done a lot of rehab and recently has done 6 and a half weeks of radiation in the Royal North Shore under professional Michael Back.

Unfortunately, the tumour has come back and Tony is back to having to fight for his life again. In saying this, 10 years ago Tony was given only a year to live. But his wife and 3 boys gave him the strength and will to fight cancer even up to now he hasn’t given up, and never will stop fighting this horrible disease called cancer that is growing in his brain.

In Tony’s own words, “I get a lot of people saying that I’m an inspiration to others, when it’s the inspiration I get from
others that inspires me.””

Kaylah, Yr
6 2014, Age 11

Tribute From Cousin and great friend Kerrie

“Whenever I talk about my cousin, I refer to him as ‘My Ton’, is it odd? Yes..but that was us.

There are so many things that Tony did and achieved in his lifetime. Which, we can all agree that the biggest was to fight for his life for over 16 years. His courage, determination and strength made him one in a million that even doctors would agree with.

Tony as also an artist, animal love and traveller. When Tony travelled around Australia with his dog Susie Que, we didn’t know where he was, who he was with or what he was doing. Sometimes for months at a time. Then, out of the blue, your would get a call or the Kombi would show up out the front and he would say “Hey, how ya going?” and talk like he saw you last weekend.

In Alice Springs he was looking after some Joeys (baby Kangaroos), and he rang one day to say “you should be so proud to have a cousin as talented as me.” I said “I don’t have any family like that, who are you?” He ws proud to say “Sick of these joey’s licking their balls til they’re red and bleeding, so I made them underpants and that stopped them!” I stood there trying to picture these Roos jumping around in different coloured homemade underpants. I eventually said, “That’s good then mate, but… you need a social life!”

A few months ago, I was looking for my sunglasses, and this is how the conversation went: “are they on your head?  No - 
on the bench? No – lounge? No – in your bed? No – why would they be in my bed?... because it’s you!” Later on, it got the better of me and I went and checked and there they were. So, I rang him back, which I KNEW was going to be a mistake! First time in my life I told him that he was right. So the comment I got back was: “I’ve always said I was smarter than you, even with brain cancer”. I told him that he could have that one, but next time I get the last say! He laughed and said “yeah, yeah…go your hardest. Love ya lots.

My Tony and I had a very special relationship. Tormenting each other and name calling was our thing. I would answer the phone  to hear: “Hey bitch”, and vice versa when I rang him. His favourite was to leave a voice message saying: “Hi, this is your handsome, talented, beautiful, favourite cousin here…answer the BLOODY PHONE! I’m more important that whatever you’re doing!” I would also leave something similar if he didn’t answer the phone. The one thing is, we never hung up the phone without saying – “Love you lots.”

I would love to have one more fight with him, but I can’t. So, in true form of us, I DO get the last say, so here it is: My Tony. This is your beautiful, talented, gorgeous, favourite cousin her, and I will always love you lots. Kerrie xoxo”

From Arti – friend in Esperence, Western Australia “Tony was filled with love, laughter, and life amidst incredible artistic and other
hands-on talents. I loved the breathtaking sunrises in Esperance and at one stage, my phone was filled with those photos. Once Tony’s talents had been revealed, I asked if he would paint me a picture of an Esperance sunrise from one of my photos. His eyes twinkled at the question and I was thrilled he said yes! He completed the painting just before my departure and my heart melted at the sight of it. He acutely noticed some imperfections whilst I took in the gorgeous painting.  Apart from his incredible creations, Tony, Irma, and the boys welcomed me into their granny flat for a few weeks. It was such a special time to get to know and connect with everyone. I could not help but wander the strength, resilience, courage, and love that was embedded in this family.  Lots of love, Arti ”

TRIBUTE FROM TONY’S WIFE IRMA…

“Well I’m afraid this party isn’t as big as your 40th, where over 100 people came from all over the country and we announced to the world we were getting married and expecting our first baby (now 12 year old Hayden), or our wedding (where we announced that Josh was on his way), but I hope you are proud of our efforts with only a week to organise it.  We can do a lot in a week – we only had a week to get together $80,000 for your brain surgery with Charlie Teo (thanks to all of our wonderful family and friends this was easily achieved).  Charlie Teo was your hero,and rightly so as he gave you another 7 years to watch and nurture your kids asthey grew up.  Charlie’s words when he looked at your scan were something along the lines of ‘That’s F!@#ing huge - but I’ll give it a crack’.  And for that we are forever grateful.  The last 5 years you have been an amazing stay at home dad.  You have an eye for detail, which means you
were much better at housework than me.  You also had a knack of getting the kids to actually do some homework rather than letting them run away and hide as they seemed to do with me… 

You had a broad and varied career and out of all the jobs you’ve done, being a father was definitely your favourite.  Aside from Charlie and your kids, the other hero’s in your life were your extended family and friends from all over the country and world.  You loved nothing better than a yarn with a good mate (of which you had about a million).  As you were an only child, you saw all of your mates as brothers and sisters.  You always enjoyed cheering other people up, usually by showing them that their problems were nowhere near as big as yours, so if you could remain positive and happy, then there’s no reason why they couldn’t either.  You would often impart a few inspirational words to someone newly diagnosed with cancer or someone just having a bad
day.  It didn’t matter where we moved to, within about a week you’d befriended every shop keeper and knew their whole life story and they knew yours. ‘We gave it our best shot’ is what you’d probably say now when referring to our mission to rid you of brain cancer.  In our short 14 years together we crammed in more than most people do in 10 lifetimes. From wrangling and raising joey’s and emu’s in the deserts of central Australia where you had the best job in the world framing pictures with your good mate Trish, to wrestling snakes and goanna’s in the beautiful rainforest of northern NSW.  We then ended up on Esperance, for the seaside experience of a lifetime (once again cementing lifelong friendships and wonderful places to return).  We recently returned to the beautiful sunshine coast hinterland amongst the support of our family and friends for this last leg of your journey. There are many funny stories we can tell of our adventures, most of them involved you driving yourself to the emergency department at the local hospital.  Like the time a wwoofer accidentally drilled right through your hand, or the time you were mowing on Christmas day and got lantana embedded in your eyeball, or the time your appendix nearly burst and you needed urgent surgery.  There were also a few near misses that luckily didn’t need an emergency visit.  Like when you used the push mower on a steep hill and you and the mower slipped backwards down the hill.  To stop
the mower from landing on top of you, you somehow managed to swing the whole mower (blades still spinning) over your head with one arm (that arm was neverquite the same again), or the time you decided it would be a good idea to tow the ride on mower up a steep incline behind the quadbike. I think you may have been a tiny bit worried when they both slipped and you nearly ended up at the
bottom of a mountain in lots of little pieces. Or what about the ute that you parked at the top of a steep incline and the handbrake failed.  You always said you can’t panel beat a write off but you managed to return that ute to it’s former glory after it looked like nothing more than a pile of scrap metal…One common theme throughout our time together was the troopie.  She travelled around the country with us a number of times.  Whenever I couldn’t find you on the weekends, I knew you’d be down in the shed making her even more
perfect attaching every 4wd accessory known to man (or down at Bunnings getting more supplies).  You’d just got her ‘perfect’ a few days before your unfortunate incident with a few trees and a lamp post, proving that sometimes you just can’t panel beat a write off.  I know you’re up there now driving her around with Suzie Q your faithful dog, waiting for us so we can have some more adentures. The other common theme in our life together apart from the troopiewas animals.  We always seemed to accumulate lots of them - orphaned joeys and emu’s that needed feeding, goats that needed milking, dogs, chickens, fish, rabbits, parrots.  Our backyard was always a bit like old macdonalds farm.  And I can’t forget Davey the horse who used to pop his head over the fence and try to steal our muesli
when we were eating breakfast in the paddock at Maa Haven.  When I first met you, you were living in a caravan in a horse paddock 20km from Alice with half a dozen orphaned joey’s in your care.  You would get up at all hours to make sure the babies would have their regular 4 hourly feeds.  I thought for sure this is a sign of a great husband, and I wasn’t wrong. You always loved your tucker, though you hardly complained when I tried to feed you with the latest ‘healthy diet’.  Though there was the odd occasion when you managed to get your hands on a meat pie with sauce or coke..   and there was always an assortment of supplements I was shoving down  your neck
hoping that each time we’d found the magic pill to ‘cure’ you.  No matter what we did, we always believed we were going to beat this thing.  Maybe that was the wrong attitude to have, but at least it kept us positive and happy believing we were going to grow old together and get to watch our kids grow up.  Even if not in body, I know you’ll be around looking after us as our boys grow into young men.    One of your favourite flowers was sunflowers, so we’ve done up a pack for people to take home. 

It would be great if you could send us your photo with the sunflowers after they have grown.  We may even make a ‘Sunflower’ book as well as the ‘Book of Funny Stories and Favourite Memories of Tony McDonald’..Your favourite foods were trifle, lemon meringue pie, ice cream cake, pie and sauce, devilled eggs and I believe before I met you perhaps you’d have the occasional beer!  We have a few of Tony’s favourite foods here for you all to enjoy today.

Finally I just want to say a few words that come to mind when I think of you, funny, courageous, strong, determined,
hardworking, happy, positive, silly, lively, loyal, honest, loving and larger than life.  These are all qualities that I see everyday in your kids.  Until we meet again.  All my love.  Irma. Xx”

Irma would really appreciate receiving your written stories, photos and memories of times with Tony, so she can create a book of memories for their boys to read in the future.  By connecting with their father through others, will be an important legacy that
you can all help her with.  Irma is happy to give you her email address to send these to.

As we acknowledge and say goodbye to Tony’s physical presence in your lives, we do so in the knowledge
that his love and memories live on.  I will share a few words from…Kahlil Gibran’s. The Prophet followed by a few
words he might like to leave with you all.  Please stay on today to continue to share memories and offers of comfort
and support.

“For what is it to die, but to stand naked in the wind, and to melt into the sun …and what is it to cease breathing, but to free the breath
from it’s restless tides, That it may rise and expand and seek the light unencumbered. Only when you drink from the river of silence shall you indeed sing. And when you have reached the mountain top, then you shall begin to climb and when the earth shall claim your limbs, then shall you truly dance.”

“Farewell My Friends

It was beautiful
As long as it lasted
The journey of my life.

I have no regrets
Whatsoever said
The pain I’ll leave behind.

Those dear hearts
Who love and care...
And the strings pulling
At the heart and soul...

The strong arms
That held me up
When my own strength
Let me down.

At the turning of my life
I came across
Good friends,
Friends who stood by me
Even when time raced me by.

Farewell, farewell My friends
I smile and
Bid you goodbye.
No, shed no tears
For I need them not
All I need is your smile.

If you feel sad
Do think of me
For that’s what I’ll like
When you live in the hearts
Of those you love
Remember then
You never die.”

(from 'Farewell My Friends' By Gitanjali Ghei (1961- 1977))

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