My name is Sam

By Sam Perks

My name is Sam, I was diagnosed with Breast Cancer 8 years ago. My story is a lot like others but thought I would share some of my memories.

I only went to the doctors because my husband insisted on me going, I didn’t have a lump, I had a crease which looked like the seam of my bra had dug into me, but in the morning, it was still there. When I went to the doctors, she referred me straight away to the hospital and talked to me about cancer, which I came away thinking – she doesn’t know what she is on about, I am not ill!

From there it was a world wind of appointments, with two operations, the first one they had not taken enough away, so they had to operate again.

After that I had 6 sessions of Chemotherapy. This was hard, and still today if I think about it, it makes me feel sick, the staff at the hospital were amazing, but I have to say it was the hardest 6 months of my life. 

They told me that I would loose my hair, so I set up a JustGiving page for me to have my hair shaved off and raised over £1000 for Breast Cancer Now .

The side effects that people see like you losing all your hair (and I mean all including your eye lashes) didn’t really bother me, I embraced it, and liked having a bald head. I remember saying to people at least I am saving money on shampoo and going to the hairdressers!

The side effects that people can not see are the worst, and difficult to talk about. If it had not been for my husband by my side at all times, I don’t know what I would have done.

It’s also the effect it has on people you know that you call friends. I lost friends through my diagnosis because they couldn’t cope with it. I had one friend that would cross to the other side of the road rather than talk to me – that was hard and still upsets me now. But then I had wonderful friends that came out of the woodwork, sent flowers, messages, took me for coffee and meals when I was having good days, and I will be always grateful to them.

My family were also fantastic and supported me all the way through.

After that I had 25 sessions of radiotherapy, which I found was like a walk in the park, it was just very time consuming as I had to go to the hospital daily, but luckily for me I didn’t get any real side effects.

Then after that I was discharged – Cancer free, time to get on with your life, pick up from where you have left off, but that is hard. Going back to work – everything had changed, staff had changed, procedures – everything was like learning the job over again! Not having any appointments felt strange, what would I do with myself, with all this time.

So, I decided to take up running, I had never run before, and hated exercise as a kid. But I knew I had to start living and doing things differently and making the most of life. My first challenge was the London Landmarks Half Marathon which I ran for Breast Cancer now, which was such a fantastic achievement and I loved doing it.

I now try and live life to the full, I keep good friends close to me, and ones that are not so good I distance myself from. My latest challenge is the London Marathon, which I have been training for the last 16 weeks, this has been hard, and it has taken over my life a bit. It is such a big distance that I am not sure how I am going to complete it – but I will, even if I must crawl across the finish line.

As I said at the beginning my story is a lot like others, if there is one thing I would like you all to take from it is to live your life to the full, to keep the people important to you close, and challenge yourself, as we only have this one life,

If I can do it so can you. xx