TikTok mum dies aged 30 after year long battle with cancer, leaving behind husband and two young children
A TikTok mum has died aged 30 following a year-long battle with cancer.
Influencer Paola Caldera had been suffering from acute lymphoblastic leukaemia since the middle of last year.
She shared her health journey with her hundreds of thousands of followers. She often said that she would keep fighting so she could look after her two young children. She died last week after she got pneumonia. Her TikTok bio has been changed to read: “Tik Tok in memory of a beloved sister, daughter, and mother. I love you, sister. God rest your soul.”
In a TikTok video posted on New Year’s Eve last year, Paola showed moments from her cancer journey - including when she shaved her head amid her on-going battle. In the caption, she urged her followers to listen to their bodies and priortise their health.
“Before the year ends I would like to share something very important with you and that is: when our body speaks to us in any way we should listen to it. After spending several days with a headache that came and went (thinking it was because of my period) very unbearable, I went to the doctor and he diagnosed me with leukemia,” she said.
“At that moment I thought my life was going to go away from me at any moment, I didn't know what was going to happen, then you realise how fragile life can be, how hard it can be for it to change us suddenly, I just thought that I had to endure everything to be able to live!! Here we are facing God's challenges.”
Comments have been turned off on the star’s page, but loved ones have posted tribute videos. One person wrote: “ Daughter of my life, I will remember you with the best smile and above all the desire to live for your children. It is not a goodbye but a see you later.”
Along with speaking candidly about her cancer battle, Paola also won many fans for her posts where she advised US immigrants on how to achieve the American Dream. She fled from her home country of Venezuela in South America before applying for political asylum in the United States.
The social media star shared advice for other Venezuelan immigrants on how to settle in America and became known for inspiring others to aspire for a better life for their children. Most of her 104,000 followers were mostly fellow Latinos also living in the US.
Paola previously told fans how her move to the US helped her eldest son, who suffers from an illness she did not disclose, as reported by NeedToKnow. She said: “The treatment was available in California and I could afford it there.”
She also said she appreciated the lifestyle and safety the US offered to herself, her husband and their two children. The proud mum would also regularly speak about how she encouraged her chilren to work as hard as possible to reach their full potential.
As well as creating lots online content, she earned money for her family by working as hotel cleaner. She would also speak of her job in her videos and told her fans that she earned more cleaning hotels in the US than she did working as a dentist in Venezuela.
Paola’s family have announced they will livestream her funeral on her TikTok page on Thursday and Friday (October 2 and 3), so followers can join virtually. They also asked fans to donate via an online funding page to help cover her funeral costs, which they estimate to be more than £13,000.