For Tom Armstead, it was at age 20 when he was first diagnosed with a Glioma Brain Tumour. 

In 2003 Tom had his first surgery to remove the tumour, in 2008 doctors again operated on him, a surgery that left him, among other things, visually impaired and with failing fine motor skills.  

Following the surgery, doctors assured him that the tumor had gone. 

Tom and his wife Brianna live at Murrumbateman with their two children, five-year-old Jasper and three-year-old Grietja. Brianna described how they met after Tom's initial surgery in 2005 and that deciding to have children was something they would have to live and deal with as a family. 

“We had time to make decisions and think about things,” she said. 

In late 2013, Tom and his family received the devastating news that the tumor had returned. 

“We were told that it was all clear and the doctors had got it and there wasn’t any tumour. At the end of 2013 we received the news that it had come back quite significantly and had moved into the motor cortex,” Brianna said. 

“He had another biopsy after that because they were reluctant to operate, just because of where it was.”

Medical professionals rated the tumor as a grade 2, which is a low-intermediate grade tumor. 

“As far as cancer goes that’s pretty good news, but we are told that with these sorts of things if you do nothing it will change and grow and become quite nasty, you have to treat them straight away.”

Since 2014 Tom has been taking an oral chemotherapy treatment which has prevented the tumor's growth. 

“Unfortunately there isn’t a lot of treatment options available, they can do surgery, which we have been told they will have to do if it grows, because of where it is there is a fairly good chance he will be left with fairly significant physical disability, particularly down the left side,” she explained. 

“It could mean a wheelchair at worst.”

Tom visits an oncologist each month and a neurosurgeon every three months to monitor the tumor.

“Chemo is the treatment until it stops working.” 

“But once it stops working, which it probably will or if it starts affecting his liver and other organs, he has to stop taking it and then they will do some surgery and get as much as they can and then they will do some radiation treatment. 

“He hasn’t had radiation treatment yet, the issue with the brain is that it can cause more issues than it fixes and you can only have it once.”

“Usually they don’t expect a long life afterwards and so the long term effects are not considered.”

Tom receives his treatment one week out of the month. 

“It doesn’t affect us all the time, it makes him feel pretty lousy one week out of the month,” she said. 

Tom is a teacher at a school in Canberra, for kids that are disengaged with their education, but also casual teaches at Yass High School and Brianna works as a social worker for the ACT Government. 

The Armstead family face each day head on and have spent the last couple of years trying to raise awareness of brain cancer and the need for research.

“There are a lot of uncertain treatments, the problem is there isn’t enough research behind them,” Brianna explained. 

“So that’s why we are trying to get people involved in beanie day and make people aware of the Mark Hughes Foundation and other fundraisers.”

Brain cancer is the leading cause of cancer death in children and adults under 40 in Australia.

Alarmingly, very little is known about what causes it or how it is treated.

The Mark Hughes Foundation was formed so that research could be carried out to decrease both the incidence of brain cancer and mortality rates associated with the illness.

“I think the more people are aware, the more support we will get and the more research we can do,” she said.  

"Because this week is Beanie Week we have asked people to take selfies and hashtag themselves in the photos, regardless if it is followed by a donation.”

The Armstead family fundraising page is called wearabeanie.everydayhero.com/au/beanies-for-tom. 

So if you're going to school today kids, whack on a beanie, if you're going to work put a beanie on, if you just plan to stay at home, it’s cold why don’t you just put on a beanie, take a pic of yourselves, put the hashtag #mhfbeanieday #beaniesfortom and tag it to the Yass Tribune site.

Please share your photos, help raise awareness of brain cancer and support a local family.