Samuel Johnson has revealed he is still struggling to cope in the aftermath of his sister’s death, seven years on.
The mother-of-two Connie Johnson lost her lengthy battle with cancer in September 2017.
The 46-year-old tells new SBS series The Hospital: In the Deep End that he can’t remember his sister not being sick, after she was diagnosed with bone cancer at age 11, before uterine cancer at 22, before her death at age 33 from breast cancer.
‘Dad and Connie came home in dad’s blue Torana, and I knew something was up,’ he said of the moment he learned Connie was ill.
‘Dad said: “She’s got a tumour.” And I didn’t know what a tumour was. Then gradually, I learned that it was cancer.’
Samuel Johnson (pictured) has revealed he is still struggling to cope in the aftermath of his sister’s death, seven years on
He continued: ‘She got cancer when she was 11 in her leg, when she was 22 in her womb and when she was 33 in her breast. And then it spread and she died, with two young kids.
‘So I don’t remember my sister not having cancer. She’s my dear sister who copped all the bullets and for some reason I’m scot-free so far.’
Sam previously opened up on the grief he still felt at losing his beloved sibling.
‘I can’t just bounce back from burying her and push forward blindly,’ an emotional Samuel told 9Honey.
The mother-of-two Connie Johnson lost her lengthy battle with cancer in September 2017. Pictured together
‘I don’t remember my sister not having cancer. She’s my dear sister who copped all the bullets and for some reason I’m scot-free so far’ he said
In 2012, the siblings launched the Love Your Sister charity, which has since raised millions in the fight against cancer.
Sam is still hard at work raising funds for Love Your Sister, but confessed it hasn’t been easy without Connie by his side.
‘My head just hasn’t been in the game. There was a bunch of stuff that she left me with that I had to make sense of,’ he explained.
‘Now that I don’t have her to help guide this, I had to do all my homework and I had to make sure that we get this right for her.’
Connie was married for 13 years to husband Mike, with whom she shared two sons, Willoughby, 18, and Hamilton, 17.
Sam told 9Honey that the boys have been remarkably resilient following their mother’s death.
He said: ‘The kids have finally got a childhood to enjoy. They never knew what it was like to just be a kid because their mum was sick since they could remember. The pain of her being gone is there, but the pain of watching her so sick is gone too.’
Samuel also claimed that his brother-in-law Mike ‘is doing the boys proud’ with his strength.
