Living for today, planning for tomorrow

When ellenor’s Cat Wilde talks about her career, one-word surfaces again and again: relationships.

For more than 20 years she has been a paediatric nurse, specialising in oncology. Now, as Children’s Team Operational Lead at ellenor – a hospice charity providing care in its inpatient ward, Wellbeing centre, and in people’s homes across Kent and Bexley – she brings the same passion for building trust and connection into the heart of children’s hospice care.

“Some people find it strange when you say you love oncology,” Cat says. “But for me, it’s about the relationships. A cancer journey lasts years, and as a Specialist Nurse you become part of the family. They rely on you for support and advice, knowing you have their back and will fight for them.”

Cat’s nursing career began at Queen Mary’s Hospital in Sidcup, on an oncology unit for children.

“That’s where I found my love of oncology”, she says. “It’s where my passion was - where I wanted to grow my career”. Later, Cat moved to University College Hospital London, working on the Teenage Cancer Trust ward, before leaving to set up and lead a new oncology service with a consultant she’d worked with in a previous role.

That service thrived: receiving excellent peer reviews, an outstanding rating, and glowing feedback from families. “During this time, we worked very closely with ellenor. I got to know the team well and decided that ellenor was for me; that I wanted to come and join them.”

For Cat, the decision was also personal. “My stepmum died under the care of ellenor. My nan died a few years ago from lymphoma. Because of my job role, I was always the one called on to help, but ellenor helped us then. I consider it a privilege to be able to work in a place that supported my loved ones at the end of their lives.”

Today, Cat leads a team of ten – five nurses and five care assistants – at ellenor. Together, they provide nursing care, respite, and end-of-life support for children and their families across Dartford, Gravesend and Swanley.

“Our role is to keep children at home for as long as possible,” Cat explains. “The children under our care have spent so much time in hospital. Being in hospital is disruptive for the child, as well as their parents and siblings - it has a huge impact on the whole family. We’re able to give antibiotics and chemotherapy at home, as well as run blood tests. A GP will accept our examination, enabling them to prescribe what the child needs - meaning the family doesn’t have to spend long hours travelling to and waiting in hospitals.”

Misconceptions around hospice care are rife, and one is that a hospice like ellenor is simply a place people “go to die. Because, while ellenor does offer support for children at the end of their life, much of its work is with young people living with life-limiting conditions. These can’t be cured, but ellenor can help families manage them to maximise quality of life and reduce symptoms and pain.

“When people hear palliative care, they think of death and dying. But we need to shine a light on the aspects people don’t see: the laughter, the fun, the joy. It’s not all about medicines and injections. It’s about singing and dancing, painting and parties; making beautiful memories.

That’s why care at ellenor is built around planning – but not only planning for the end.

“Advance care plans may be medicalised – oxygen, interventions, CPR – but when I do them I also put in things like ‘they want to go to the cinema once a week with their friends.’ Then I ask: How can we make that happen?

“It’s not just the negative aspect of where a child may be heading,” Cat continues, “it’s about fulfilling what they want to do prior to those days, and making that a key part of the plan. Their care should involve doing all the day-to-day things they want to do to help them feel as normal as they can.”

ellenor cares for people of all ages, from babies to those over 100. At 18, patients transition into adult services, either with ellenor or other local providers. For Cat, who specialises in child oncology, this can be especially emotional as children she and her team have supported move into adulthood.

“Recently, a patient we’ve been caring for her was turning 18 – so we arranged a party for him here in the hospice. We collected him in the van and brought him to ellenor for a meal of his choosing: steak and chips. The whole team blocked their afternoon schedules out to be part of his party. We had four hours of games, music – and a few naughty jokes! The sun was shining, and we sat in the garden. He had a wonderful time.”

The team also gave the patient a memory book, filled with photos from his years with ellenor.

“He was visibly very moved,” Cat recalls. “I’d only been here about three weeks, and I went home that day knowing I was part of something incredible. I knew I’d made the right choice.”

ellenor’s children’s team doesn’t just care for patients; they support whole families. That means working with schools to draw up healthcare plans, educating teachers, and making sure siblings are supported too.

“Historically, siblings have been the ‘forgotten’ ones,” Cat explains. “It’s terrifying for them, seeing a brother or sister go through so much. But involving them in the care helps them feel they’re contributing - that they’re doing something to help. When they feel they can play a part, it makes a huge difference.”

For Cat and her team, children’s palliative care isn’t about focusing solely on the inevitable. It’s about ensuring that life, however long or short, is filled with meaning.

“You only get one shot at end-of-life care,” Cat reflects. “We have to get it right. But more than that, we’re here to make sure that, even as families plan for tomorrow, they can live for today - with laughter, memories, and moments of normality in a time that is anything but normal.”