For 18-year-old Sam Shelton, life is looking pretty good at the moment.

Sam is the son of Tim and Michelle Shelton, of Bairnsdale, who have five children.

Earlier this year Sam left Gippsland Grammar to pursue his dream job of becoming a carpenter.

He was lucky enough to score a job with a reputable boutique building company that focuses on constructing in an environmentally friendly way.

The company has an 11-star environmental rating and has its origins in Europe.

He spent the long weekend with his family water skiing at Newlands Arm and is excited about living in Melbourne, which he has always wanted to do.

Sam has even more reason to smile. He’s just been released from the Royal Children’s Hospital cancer team after almost five years of regular tests and given a clean bill of health.

But life wasn’t always so rosy.

In July 2015, Sam was diagnosed with a brain tumor.

After enduring more than a fortnight of excruciating headaches and many trips to the doctor, Sam’s parents took him to a sports clinic in Melbourne where a walnut sized brain tumor was detected.

“This tumor was building up pressure in his brain which was why he was getting migraines,” Michelle said.

He underwent emergency surgery at the Royal Children’s Hospital that night to relieve the pressure.

“It was blocking circulation to his brain and starting to make his eyes bulge,” Michelle said, explaining that it wasn’t visible to anyone else except for a trained medical specialist.

A team of neurosurgens came to look at Sam. Tim recalls the moment a doctor informed him of his son’s condition.

“Our heads were spinning,” Tim said.

Major surgery to remove the tumor was scheduled two days later.

“The tumor was a solid mass of cancer in the centre of the brain with major blood vessels that feed the brain so they were unable to get it all,” Tim said.

The plan was instead to try to treat the tumor. The Sheltons sought out the opinion of world renowned brain surgeon, Charlie Teo, who’s based in Sydney.

He agreed with the RCH team that surgery was unlikely to be successful.

Relieved that they had sought a second opinion, the Sheltons prepared Sam for rounds of chemotherapy and radiotherapy.

Sam’s treatment finished in April 2016 but he was required to attend at the RCH every three months for scans and MRIs.

Last week he was released from that program with doctors confident his tumor won’t return.

Sam couldn’t be happier.

He had received the maximum dose of chemotherapy and was, in his mother’s words, “a walking skeleton”.

“It’s been an anxious time for us all,” Michelle said.

At the height of Sam’s treatment, the Sheltons quit their jobs as pharmacists and based the family in Melbourne.

The couples other four children attended public schools in Melbourne and the family tried to keep a normal routine as much as possible.

In 2017, they took a year travelling overseas as a family to Europe, North America and China.

In Italy, the family rented a villa and the kids attended a local school.

Sam says the experience of enduring cancer at such a young age has changed him.

“I can see things in me that I don’t think I would have if this hadn’t have happened to me. I came out of it a lot for the better,” he said.

Michelle and Tim also believe the experience has changed their outlook on life.

Michelle has returned to Bairnsdale Regional Hospital’s pharmaceutical department to do clinical work, while Tim is working as a consultant, helping Australian businesses develop an Amazon presence.

IMAGE: Sam Shelton with his parents, Tim and Michelle, at Newlands Arm this week. K222-5482