A Closer Shave.

Well, I can now happily let you in on the magazine that I was going to be in (was being the important word!). Not anymore though, Closer Magazine have bumped me! They no longer want my story for some reason or other (which I am quite relieved about in all honesty).

However, I am now being passed down the food chain and my story is going to another magazine. This one is more of the "real life story" Take-A-Break style magazine - I am not even sure if it is glossy - and I feel much more comfortable that it has found it's natural place in the world. It will be 6 weeks before the issue comes out and anything could happen in that timescale.

I think I will feel a little less excited about talking to the media after this. The process has seen me sitting on a packed commuter train going home after work talking through my story with the writer on my mobile. It must have been quite odd sitting next to someone talking about "eating their own hair of their pillow". Also, the editors are not even sure they can keep the reference to Breakthrough's Charity Run and their website details in the article. That's only the main reason I agreed to it and despite my contact at Breakthrough's best efforts they are insisting that the word count is really tight. Surely they could cut some of the useless, stupid information they asked me about in the interview!

But the photo's have come through that they might use for the article. At the start of this process a photographer "popped round" and took some photos of me in the garden. He sent me copies of 6 or so, I could only find one or two where I was smiling. I expect they want to use photos of me looking rather disgruntled that I was unfortunate enough to get breast cancer. Here's a smiley one.

Festival fun

This bank holiday weekend I went camping at a music festival. It was such fun, although slightly wet and cold at times (even with my 6 layers on!!!) - but that just adds to the fun (hmmmm!). I went to Glastonbudget; a Glastonbury style festival made up of tribute bands. My favorites were Guns 2 Roses, The Bon Jovi Experience and The Fillers. I certainly had a good bop around.

Today I received....

.. a lovely unique card in the post;



























My friend Hanneke did the Race for Life the sunday before last. She and her international team of girlies ran/walked and raised lots of money for Cancer Research UK. The runners get to stick notes on their back if they have been touched by cancer or know someone who has been touched by cancer. Hanneke dedicated her run to me, as you can see. Her team then all signed the back with messages and sent it to me in the post. How nice is that!

Selling Out

Well, I’ve gone and proved I will do anything in the name of charity. I’ve only gone and sold my BC-story to a well known celebrity gossip magazine, oh the shame!

Why have I done this, well I have 3 reasons;
1. Breakthrough breast cancer contacted me and wanted someone to speak to the media about their story and to raise awareness of breast cancer in younger women (a very worthwhile reason and if it encourages girls who find a lump to get it sorted then it’s a very good thing!)
2. By doing the article I would help promote Breakthrough’s 5K charity walk to raise all important funds (again, an important cause).
3. I would get a nice wadge of cash that I could donate to charity and give myself a warm fuzzy feeling (I am thinking Breast Cancer Care or the Willow Foundation - I will not look at shoes!!!!!)

I am not going to tell you when it will be or which celebrity gossip magazine (apart from it’s definitely at the trashier end!) because I would rather you all didn't look at it. But, I have decided that letting you all in on why I have done it is probably better than you all coming across it out of the blue. So if you are ever in a doctors waiting room or on a train journey with a magazine and you come across me in an article sandwiched between;

“Jordan's big botched boob job”

and

“My husband ran off with my sister-in-law’s-best-friend's-granny”

do please remember the 3 very commendable reasons above!

Oh, and remember, although it’s going to be written in the First Person, I won’t have written it! The freelance writer is going to do that after we have a “phone interview”..... I can just see it now ...“Dawn was only 29 and on her honeymoon when disaster struck and she found the lump that was going to change her life for ever……”. So that's it for me now and being the new face of breast cancer. I am going to be like one of those models who can’t be taken seriously because they once did a glamour shoot – there goes my high-brow media darling career flying out of the window.

Anyway, I better go – I have to go and fill out the application form for the Jeremy Kyle show :-D

Developments on going Nationwide.

After sitting at my letter box and waiting for the postman to deliver ME through my letterbox, I contacted my contact at Nationwide and asked when I could expect to see it so that I could move away from the letterbox until it was time. She said that the AGM forms and Internet sites are now almost complete and voting starts in June - so it must be imminent. Plus they have invited me to go down to Birmingham for the actual AGM to see how much money gets raised by the initiative! Now, AGM probably equals boring.... but I am slightly tempted by the celebrity status - oooh perhaps I would have to collect a huge cardboard cheque like they do on comic relief ;-D

18 month breast cancer survivor!

Now, I think this is how it works; I've reached the 18 months since diagnosis time point (well I will have in exactly 3 days). I am not sure whether you count from diagnosis or the end of treatment ... but I guess I am still here 18 months after my diagnosis, so that's 18 months of surviving since the unwelcome intrusion of that little lump into my life.

I am regularly giving myself a check over and apart from the odd "was that a lump, was that scar tissue dilemma" the boobs seem to be behaving themselves. I'm not reading too much into this milestone... and sometimes I do feel like I have a little internal ticking timepiece that's just waiting for a tapping on the shoulder and interruption to a very pleasant little life. And I am enjoying life at the moment. I am working 4 days a week (3 in work, one from home) and I am in a really great little routine. I feel like I am still challenging myself with this, just enough to stretch myself and feel I am slowly pushing up what I can achieve. I am getting into the exercise; Swimming, Pilates and the new goal I've set myself to get out and get at least a 15min-30minutes walk every day (not when I am swimming or doing Pilates of course that would just be silly amounts!). Then there's my exciting little vegetable patch and garden to be getting out in the sun to play with. After the disastrous fight with the slugs last year which resulted in about 1 lettuce and 1 courgette, I have decided to take a different track and am going down the Soft-Fruit route. I have raspberry, blackcurrant and blueberry bushes, strawberries and the ever increasing rhubarb-it really is very exciting (well I think it is ;-D). Oh, and I've been and had my first real hair cut and highlights. Well, hidden highlights - what the point of paying for highlights that you cant see is, I don't know - but the hairdresser made it sound really funky! Then I have had some new front teeth (I've had a nice new bridge at the front that I have been putting off for the last 18months!). And, yes, that's about it!

Things are just tickety-bo right now (which is probably why I've gone all quite on the blog front).