He wasn’t fine.

The MRI showed a tumour the size of a golf ball. Stage 4 Glioblastoma — GBM, the most aggressive form of brain cancer. We went from “probably stress” to “this is serious” in the space of a single appointment. I remember sitting in the car park afterwards and not being able to remember how to start the car.

That’s the moment nobody prepares you for. Not the diagnosis itself — though that’s devastating — but the hours and days that follow it, when you’re expected to make enormous decisions while your nervous system is in complete shock.

In the weeks after Nic’s diagnosis, I did what I’ve always done when I don’t know something: I researched. Obsessively. I have over 20 years in client services and operations, which means I’m trained to find the information, organise it, and act on it. I turned that skillset entirely toward GBM.

What I found surprised me. There is a significant body of evidence around metabolic oncology, nutrition, and lifestyle approaches that may support brain cancer patients — evidence that exists in peer-reviewed journals, that oncologists and researchers are actively exploring. And almost none of it was reaching families like ours at the moment they needed it most.

The gap wasn’t in the science. The gap was in the translation.

Families sitting in the same car park I sat in — people who are terrified and sleep-deprived and trying to do right by someone they love — were either getting nothing, or they were falling down rabbit holes of pseudoscience and false hope. Neither felt acceptable to me.

I started @the_neuro_farmacist on Instagram because I couldn’t find the resource I needed, so I built it.

It’s an evidence-based space specifically for GBM caregivers — people navigating the metabolic side of brain cancer, trying to understand what the research actually says about nutrition, ketogenic approaches, supplementation, lifestyle factors. I’m not a clinician. I’m a caregiver who learned to read the literature, ask better questions, and sit in rooms with specialists without feeling completely lost.

What I wish someone had told me at the beginning: you are allowed to ask questions. You are allowed to say “I’ve read this study — what do you think?” You are allowed to push for the scan, even when a doctor tells you everything is probably fine.

I pushed for that scan. I’m glad I did.

There are things nobody tells you about being a brain cancer caregiver. They don’t tell you that your grief will be non-linear — that you’ll have ordinary Tuesday mornings and then be completely undone by a song on the radio. They don’t tell you how isolating it is, because most people your age haven’t been here yet. They don’t tell you how much energy it takes just to keep yourself functional enough to show up for the person you love.

Nic is still showing up every day. So am I.

In October, I ran the TCS Sydney Marathon — all 42.195 kilometres of it — for the Cure Brain Cancer Foundation, specifically in support of the GBM AGILE trial. GBM AGILE is an adaptive clinical trial working to find better treatments for this disease faster. I’m not a runner by nature. I trained anyway. I crossed that finish line thinking about every family who has ever sat in a hospital car park not knowing how to start the car.

If you’re in that place right now — newly diagnosed, somewhere in the middle of treatment, or years into a journey that has reshaped your entire life — I want you to know that @the_neuro_farmacist exists for you. It’s not a community of false promises. It’s a place where the science is taken seriously and the emotional reality of caregiving is taken seriously alongside it.

Julie Crawshay built it because she needed it. You’re welcome to use it.

Come find us on Instagram: @the_neuro_farmacist.