You’re Just Too Good To Be True

In advance of the 25th anniversary of Lucilla Hyland’s death 4th August, we asked Claire O’Reilly, one of Lucilla’s friends who set up the Oesophageal Cancer Fund (OCF) in her name, to tell us more about this charity that is powered by friendship.  This is Claire’s story:

“I met Lucilla Hyland in 1972 in primary school at Holy Child Killiney and Lucilla was always full of energy and mischief.  One of her school reports said Lucilla could run a country and that she should be commended for her ‘unflagging energy in espousing so many causes’.  So that tenacity was there from the start, as were Lucilla’s superb organisational skills and her ability to get the rest of us to collaborate with her.  I remember how, on our last day of school, starting the fun from Lucilla’s house as usual.  We headed up to the school in our pyjamas, all reasonably well behaved, considering some of the previous year were expelled for throwing someone into the pond. 

After school, we all got busy with life and love, but we still kept in touch.  We all hit our forties in 2000 and it was shortly after my 40th birthday party that Lucilla asked me to work in her Event Management company, just two mornings a week.  I felt friends working together didn’t always work out but she asked me to give it a go and that we would review it in October.  That review never happened.  It was around that time that Lucilla started our school friends’ book club which was more of a social chat and the books might be discussed at the end of the night, briefly.  And that still goes on today – both the book club and the chat!

I know that she had difficulty swallowing food and that set in motion a series of medical appointments and an endoscopy.  When Lucilla was diagnosed in March 2001 with oesophageal cancer, something none of us knew much about, she was still looking and doing very well.  And she was determined to raise awareness about oesophageal cancer.   So, the Lucy Ball we were planning together was to be a celebration of Lucilla’s life and recovery.  We were going to get our children to sing ‘You’re just too good to be true’ by Andy Williams as she loved him. 

Sadly, that wasn’t to be, as Lucilla died on the same day as my father’s funeral - Saturday 4th August 2001.  That was a tremendously difficult time for me, my family and for my friends.

Despite the grief, we decided to continue with The Lucy Ball in October 2001 which raised a whopping IR£145,000.  We all helped, but Claire Cronin, one of Lucilla’s closest friends, got us all through it.  After that, we needed a big awareness day, so the Lucy Lollipop Day began in April 2002. The lollipop symbol was chosen because difficulty swallowing is a red flag symptom.  We were so confident we brought 36,000 Lollipops into Grafton Street and came home with about 35,500!  But that was the start.

After that, I took on the job as OCF’s Fundraising Co-ordinator from 2002 – 2014.  It just grew and grew.  Noelle Ryan was an amazing driver of the lollipop campaign.  We both worked from home, and it was very overwhelming at times, both of us with young children.  I’d be at the computer at 8.30am and would suddenly look up and remember the dinner needed to be cooked!  But the reward was to see people becoming aware of the symptoms and getting treatment early and that made it worthwhile.  TV3 were great supporters in those early days, and we knew from feedback that people watching were prompted to go to their GP with symptoms and lives were saved. 

Lucilla would be gobsmacked with what has been achieved, with everyone working so hard on her behalf and it has been very stressful at times (she wouldn’t like that stress for us).  But having attended some of the Patient Support meetings and the Open Research Night in Trintiy St. James’s Cancer Institute, I know that our friend would be so, so proud of what has been achieved by OCF.  The awareness we have raised, the people who have survived because of what OCF has done, and the huge fundraising into research.  At the patient support meetings I attended, it is so powerful to see how the patients support each other and how they share their tips to deal with the post-surgery challenges with food, sleep and exercise.  A real community of friends.

I still manage the Lollipop Day Grafton Street fundraising, as I have done from the beginning.  We are blessed to have a base in Powerscourt Town House Centre since the start and this year I had almost 180 students from five different schools involved.  I have great support with me – family and friends - filling the buckets, getting t-shirts ready, taking names, emptying buckets and checking students in and out. 

OCF means so much to me and has become part of my identity over the last 25 years.  I have to thank Noelle for encouraging me –I couldn’t have done it without her.  She has helped bring OCF to where it is today and the team running it now are amazing.  They really help keep us all engaged and informed.  Meanwhile, I’m very proud to help organise the OCF Lunch on 30th October 2026 in memory of our friend and to raise much needed funds as we celebrate 25 years of supporting patients, families, awareness and hope.

Lucilla was so important to so many people and we are delighted to continue the legacy of our good friend who really was just too good to be true.”