After a battle with cancer, one young woman feels like she has a second chance at life. Ashlee Jones, 25, is a proud survivor of thyroid cancer after being diagnosed at a young age.
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"It was unexpected, I guess," she said.
"I started with a goitre on my throat, and we got it checked out, they couldn't find anything abnormal about it.
"Then I had the surgery to get it out, and that is when they found a few cancer cells. Then I had to get the rest taken out."
For treatment, Ms Jones needed to surgeries as well as radiotherapy treatment.
"I had to take a couple of nuclear pills - it was an iodine treatment," she said.
"I was in lockdown for a couple of days because I was radioactive so I could not be around people.
"When I was well enough to leave, I had to go back to my specialist, and my thyroid was not functioning properly, so now I am on pills for the rest of my life."
When it was time for her first surgery, Ms Jones said she did not think the truth of what was happening sunk in.
"It is hard to pinpoint how I was feeling," she said.
"I did not know how to handle it because I did not know anyone who had dealt with it, and I did not have anyone to relate to or talk to about it.
"The second time, the reality that it was cancer sunk in. I was scared, worried if I was going to be here still and what would happen to my daughter."
Ms Jones said cancer not only impacted her life but saw her daughter become anxious.
"It had a big impact on my daughter's life," she said.
"She had a bit of separation anxiety because she was at a young age.
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"I was diagnosed around 2014, and my daughter was one. I had just moved over from New Zealand. The goitre did not come up until I was pregnant with my daughter."
Ms Jones has been participating in Relay for Life since 2017, proudly wearing the purple sash labelled 'survivor'.
Her sister, mother, father and daughter all walked proudly beside her.
"It feels like I have a second chance," Ms Jones said.
"I am so happy about life now [that I know] that it could have been taken away from me. "