My Breast Cancer treatment was horrendous with all the evil side effects of sickness and hair loss from the chemo and the radiation burns from the radiotherapy add to that dealing with it psychologically. Feeling less of a woman with only one breast and no hair, I could not look at myself in the mirror for a very long time.
I like to think that I am a strong person, but this thing was really getting me down. People would say to me how strong I was and how well I was dealing with it but, behind closed doors I had some very low moments and cried my tears in private.
Rather than dwell on my condition I decided I needed to do something positive so, together with a group of friends I decided to raise money to help in the fight against cancer. As such we organised a 5 km walk along Torrevieja sea front and invited all who took part to wear pink, and so the fund-raising group “Maria and the Pink Ladies” was born.
Initially it was only going to be the one walk, but it was so successful that we decided to continue as a fund raising group to help in the fight against cancer, and to date we have raised almost €570,000.
During one of my regular CT scans it was discovered the tumour of over 20 years ago in the UK was growing bigger. The tumour had lain dormant for all this time but since my breast cancer diagnosis it had grown over 16 cms in a year. My oncologist decided to try and shrink it with chemotherapy, my hair had grown back by now to my shoulders so I was not looking forward to losing it again but the inevitable happened and I lost my hair again, as I have always been proud of my appearance and liked to look after myself I was absolutely devastated.
The chemo didn´t work and the tumour actually grew to a massive 25cms in my right buttock, and another 7cm in my pelvis. It was decided to surgically remove the tumour but only the part in my buttock first. The surgeon said it was the biggest he had removed and it was “like a melon”.
The removal of the smaller tumour some months later was the one that almost broke my resolve as I didn`t think my body could take any more, emotionally I definitely couldn´t.
But you do because you have to, don´t you ?
