In the quiet, metronomic world of swimming laps in a pool, Belinda Hall is set to find more than just a workout.
This March, every stroke she takes and every length she completes carries the weight of a mother’s love and the solemnity of a promise kept.
Belinda is returning to the water to embark on a gruelling physical challenge inspired by her son, Beau Hewitt, who passed away from cancer a few days before his 13th birthday last year.
The timing of her return to the pool is bittersweet as it coincides with the first anniversary of Beau’s passing and what would have been his 14th birthday.
She will take part in ‘86km for a Cure’, swimming 86 kilometres across the month, roughly five kilometres a day, marking the number of children diagnosed with cancer in Australia each month.
“Beau had seen me swim a couple of times but obviously not at the level that I was swimming before I had both the boys,” Belinda said.
“He would say ‘mummy I want you to go back swimming’. So that is what I will do.”
A former competitive swimmer, Belinda admits the distance will test her physically and emotionally.
“For me it is a very big challenge, but it means so much to me and the promise I made Beau. As hard as it is going to be, I think about the pain and suffering that Beau went through and it is going to be fine in comparison.”
The swim will raise funds for essential research at the Children’s Cancer Institute (CCI) in Randwick, where Belinda now serves as a family ambassador. More than 4,948 participants have already raised more than $669,000 through the national campaign.
“Without research and without trying to find cures, the everyday suffering and pain continues for all the children and their family’s fighting cancer,” Belinda said.
“Beau made me promise him that I would stop it as best we can.
“I am not capable of doing that, but I am trying to help all the other kids.”
Belinda hopes the country will rally behind this important cause.
“If everybody in Australia donated one gold coin, the monies raised would help so very much and help change the lives of so many children.
“Once it does impact your family and you see what these children are going through it changes you as a person. The children who have cancer go through so much, yet they continue to smile.
“Beau said, ‘I just want to be a normal child mummy’. That is not what you want to hear.”
After weeks of uncertainty, Beau was eventually diagnosed in March 2024 with an extremely rare epithelial carcinoma, one of only 51 recorded cases worldwide.
In December that year, the family believed remission was within reach after a long period of radiation.
“The doctors were confident enough that we would ring the bell and be in remission,” Belinda said.
“We had a scan on the 17th of December and that scan came back that the cancer had spread again. It was absolutely devastating.”
From there, Beau’s condition rapidly deteriorated.
“We did not expect that he would pass away. We remained positive,” she said.
“He ended up breaking his femur, just from the cancer effecting his bones.
“He was in a wheelchair for a little while and had ongoing radiation right up until the day he passed away.”
Belinda described the daily emotional toll.
“I would walk into his room and be strong and then walk out and burst into tears and that was daily,” she recalls.
At night, mother and son had conversations no parent imagines discussing with a 12-year-old.
“We would have these big conversations about what he was going to send after he passed away, which was incredibly difficult because you are talking to a 12-year-old about the afterlife. He spoke about sending birds, rainbows and sunsets and that is all that we see now.”
Before he died on March 18 last year, Beau had become an inspiration to countless people, including many he had never met.
He formed a close bond with Manly league stars and brothers Tom, Jake and Ben Trbojevic, who regularly visited him in hospital and at home.
“They formed a really close relationship where Beau would have their numbers and would text them,” Belinda said.
Even while fighting cancer, Beau’s concern was rarely for himself.
When Tom was sidelined with injury, Beau messaged him, worried about his recovery.
After the Sea Eagles won their first game of the season the players Face Timed Beau from the changing room.
“That was, as Beau said, ‘the best night of his life’.”
He had planned to celebrate his 13th birthday watching Manly play Canberra at 4 Pines Park. But sadly he passed away a few days before the game, and instead his family walked onto the field as guests of honour to deliver the match ball.
“It was the most emotional time of my life,” said Belinda. “But it was a huge honour for us all.”
Cancer remains the leading cause of disease-related death for children in Australia.
About 1,000 young people are diagnosed each year and three children a week lose their life despite survival rates improving to more than 80 percent.
Belinda says research is the only way forward.
“We have to keep going,” she says. “If we can make a difference somewhere, one child, two children.
“I do not want another parent to feel like this.
“It is so very hard to lose a child, and we miss Beau so very much.”
For Belinda, every lap in March will carry her son’s voice.
It is 86 kilometres for Beau and for every child still fighting.
For information about 86km for a Cure, visit www.ccia.org.au
You can support Belinda’s fundraising directly here
