A grieving mum was forced to spend Easter trapped at home with her son’s decomposing body after hospice workers wrongly told her that funeral directors don’t work Bank Holidays.
Lianne Roban, 34, from Dunstable, Bedfordshire, said she had no choice but to leave 13-year-old Kian’s corpse in his bedroom, covered by a sheet to keep flies away and surrounded by fans – after doctors first dismissed his symptoms of bone cancer as a tooth coming through.
‘It was absolutely traumatising,’ she told . ‘Every time I went into his room, his eyes were open and I just felt so scared.
‘His room started to get warm. My neighbours, bless them, brought fans to try to keep his body cool.’
Although Kian’s body was finally moved to a funeral home, he remains in limbo because paperwork delays mean his death has still not been registered.
Until that happens, staff are legally barred from preparing his body for burial – meaning Kian must remain on a slab surrounded by his favourite teddies, slowly decaying as his mother waits helplessly.
‘It’s ridiculous – he’s just lying there, my beautiful boy,’ single mother Ms Roban said of her only child, who she cared for full-time.
The funeral home has been making frantic calls in a bid to speed things up – but so far to no avail.
‘There’s so much red tape getting in the way and the only person this is hurting is Kian,’ Ms Roban said.
‘I wanted an open casket, I wanted to be able to see my baby – I’m not going to be able to do that now, the undertaker has already told me.’
With funeral plans still on hold, Ms Roban launched a GoFundMe page to give Kian ‘the send-off he deserves.’
Kian died at home on Easter Sunday, exactly a week before his 14th birthday, following a long fight against Ewing sarcoma – a rare and aggressive form of bone cancer that was left undiagnosed for months.
Ms Roban said she raised concerns with her GP and dentist in late 2019 after noticing swelling in Kian’s face, but was told it was likely a tooth coming through.
As he grew thinner, weaker, and began nodding off at school, she took him to Luton and Dunstable University Hospital five times in two months – but staff sent him home each time without ordering scans.
Ms Roban said she was forced to get down on her knees and beg for Kian to be scanned during their final A&E visit – acting on the advice of a worried ambulance driver who warned her not to leave without proper testing.
But she claims a doctor brushed her off, saying: ‘There are people coming in from A&E who need it more than Kian – it’s not life or death.’
It was only after another doctor agreed to a scan that a large tumour was found in his cheek. Struggling to breathe, he was immediately rushed into intensive care and placed on a ventilator.
‘When we got to the specialists at Addenbrooke’s, they asked me, “Why did it take so long for him to get to us?”‘ she said. ‘I told them, “I’ve been trying.”‘
Despite the late diagnosis, Kian bravely fought through months of chemotherapy and radiotherapy.
By November 2023, a scan showed no evidence of disease – a moment Ms Roban described as ‘the happiest we’d ever been’.
‘We thought we could finally plan a life,’ she said. ‘We thought we were free.’
But in March last year, they were told that Kian’s cancer had returned – this time as a large, aggressive brain tumour.
Doctors were unable to safely remove Kian’s tumour, which returned after an attempted surgery, and he was placed on palliative care.
In a heartbreaking moment, he turned to his mother and said: ‘Mummy, the doctor said that if I did this, if I did this, if I did this, I would be OK – but I’m still sick, I’m not getting any better and this isn’t living.’
She added: ‘He said that he hadn’t lived, and he hadn’t found love and he wanted to have children and all these things that he wanted. And he cried in my arms, I remember, for most of the day.’
Ms Roban said the hospice stay was far from the respite they had been promised – alleging she was left to administer chemotherapy herself, and that basic tasks like nasal rinses were neglected.
At times she had to order syringes and other medical supplies online to care for her son.
Despite everything, Kian – who was diagnosed with autism aged five and was once largely non-verbal – remained loving and cheerful throughout his illness.
‘He loved people,’ she said. ‘He would stroke the nurses’ elbows and faces. He loved hugs and affection.
‘He told me every day how much he loved me and I told him everyday how much I loved him.
‘He was my best friend. We’d follow each other everywhere and talk to each other all the time and message each other, even if we’re in the next room, he would WhatsApp me GIFs and little videos.’
In his final moments, Ms Roban and her mother sang to Kian and kissed his hands as he slipped away at home.
‘I never wanted him to be scared,’ she said. ‘We held his hand and told him it was OK.’
Keech Hospice and Luton and Dunstable University Hospital have been approached for comment.