51É«APP

Following many appointments, ultrasounds and even a trip to A&E in an ambulance, I was told 'it’s just fibroids' and left feeling like I was making a fuss.

After almost a year of trying to be heard, I finally received the devastating news. It wasn’t fibroids – it was stage four bowel cancer.

As a healthy, active 43-year-old, this came as a huge shock. When I look back at photos of what I was doing in that time - surfing, e-foiling, snowboarding, paddleboarding and jumping off cliffs in Wales - it’s hard to imagine I had such an aggressive cancer growing inside me.

How I was finally diagnosed

In May 2025, I returned from a trip to the Cayman Islands, and my ovaries were visibly protruding from my stomach.

Finally, I was taken seriously and told to go straight to A&E, and I was given a CEA test. This is an inflammatory blood marker test to check test cancer levels. Shockingly, my results came in at 4000 – normal results are around 2.5 to 5.

Two months of testing continued, and in July 2025, I was given the news that I had a life expectancy of three to six months and offered palliative care. I was very frustrated, and I was angry. I know my body, I knew something was wrong, but I also knew that the NHS was operating on an overwhelmed system already and I felt guilty about taking up time and resources. But really, I should have pushed because now, here I was - finally being heard and it was all looking like it was all too late.

That’s when I decided to sharpen my elbows and get to the front. I was not going to be dismissed again. I would not let this define me or allow anyone to tell me when my life is over.

Advocating for myself

I have led an amazing life full of travel, adventure, unique experiences and opportunities I would never have encountered had it not been for my work as a high-profile nanny.

I have worked in St Tropez, New York, Turkey, Majorca, Egypt, Madrid, Cayman Islands and two ski seasons in France, but it was my work in London that saved my life. I had worked for a doctor in Clapham and when I was told that nothing could be done, I reached out to him, pleading for his help and advice.

Dr Toby Dean put me in contact with Dr Kia Keen Shiu at UCLH, and I started the move to London for cancer treatment. First, though I needed a London GP and a London address.

I had one last appointment in Leicester to have a colonoscopy. They couldn’t pass the camera further than my sigmoid colon and wanted to send me home. This thought terrified me – I was imagining what it would feel like to have my bowel rupture, so one of my best friends, Jess, who had come to the appointment with me, wheeled me down to A&E.

I instinctively knew that I needed to be fitted with a stoma. I requested to see a surgeon and demanded to be fitted with one. My argument was, why would they not do preventative surgery rather wait for my bowel to rupture and then do reactive surgery? But again, it was coming down to resources and a tick box system.

I did understand at that point that my cancer was everywhere – my sigmoid colon, my lungs, lymph nodes, ovaries and I had peritoneal disease - so maybe the thinking was, what was the point of stretching the NHS for a complicated surgery that was not going to cure this patient?

But thankfully my move to London was underway, so while I was in A&E I had contacted Dr Shiu. He told me to check out of Leicester hospital, come to UCLH, and that they would fit me with a stoma and cut out as much of the cancer as they could.

This ultimately saved my life. Had it not been for that surgery, I would not have made it to Christmas 2025.

Life-saving abdominal surgery

It was a huge surgery, I had my sigmoid colon and a section of my small bowel resected, both ovaries, appendix, omentum and 27 lymph nodes removed.

At this point, I was given two to three weeks recovery time, however, I checked out of hospital after just one week, called myself a cab and checked in to the Four Seasons to stay with my friend Melissa who had flown over from Chicago to visit me in hospital.

The next day, we actually walked 17,000 steps around London. I am so deeply grateful to Dr Toby Dean and Dr Kia Keen Shiu because without them, I would not be alive today.

In that time, I believe I’ve shown how much life I have in me. After the surgery I had chemo on a clinical trial, Folfiri and Avastin. I tolerated this well, I believe due to some other supplements I was also taking to support my immune health and my microbiome.

Abseiling for Maggie's

On my second round of chemo, I actually felt well enough to abseil down the Leadenhall Building in London and raised £13,000 for Maggie51É«APP™s. 

By round nine of my chemo, I had travelled to Guyana to do charity work with The Guyana Foundation and I stopped off in Barbados on the way home, to spend nine days surfing.

Now, I surf with a stoma, and that stoma has saved my life. I have just returned from my second surf trip to Portugal this summer. 

My prognosis is still six to eighteen months, as I have been told I have a particularly aggressive BRAF mutation that grows quickly (it’s been described as a bit of a turbo cancer).

Continuing treatment

I found the clinical trial I was on to be all consuming with two to three visits to the hospital each week. I decided that I wanted to go on with living my life as much as I can. So, I took some breaks in my treatment to travel and have adventures, and essentially do the things I love.

Sadly, this resulted in my cancer markers rising too much to continue the trial and I am now on an entirely different treatment. My treatment is now a targeted therapy, Cetuximab and Encorafenib.

This was brutal at first. It made me feel very ill with headaches and nausea, loss of appetite and stomach ache. At one point, I thought it was the beginning of the end, but I’ve found that it has got better with time as my body adjusts.

Apparently, this treatment goes into the cell and switches off the BRAF mutation that is producing the cancerous cells, so it isn’t any wonder that my whole body feels it. However, this treatment suits me much better as I now go into hospital for a short infusion every two weeks and leave with the encorafenib to take every day, at the same time for the duration of the therapy.

The importance of support

My family support me fully in my treatment and my travels – they are okay because I am okay. I protect them from how bad I feel at times and try to only be upbeat and positive.

I want to bring only positive vibes to my energy. I am also fortunate enough to have a wonderful support group of friends from all around the world, and the love and support I receive from both friends and family lifts me up and gives me the strength to keep pushing forwards.

Maggie51É«APP™s, Royal Free has also been there for me. After my diagnosis, when I started chemo, I was unable to work so I looked for things in the area to do to keep my mind and body stimulated.

I came across Maggie51É«APP™s and all the classes and programs they offer, and I joined art therapy, qigong, yoga, their bowel cancer support group, but the most important session I signed up to was psychology with Tim.

I had been so busy self-advocating, fighting to be heard and staying strong for everyone, I hadn’t allowed myself to cry at all. On the first session with Tim, I cried all the way through – it didn’t feel negative, it felt safe, it felt positive to let the emotions move through me and release all the tension that I’d been carrying on my journey.

Advice to others

My advice to anyone going through something similar to me would be to advocate for yourself. We all know our own bodies, and we know when something is off. Please don’t feel like you are making a fuss or feel guilty that you are using up NHS resources.

Cancer is such a silent killer, and the rise in early onset cancers means too many young people are getting diagnosed too late. Early detection can mean the difference between life or death.

I often wonder if my CEA levels had been tested sooner, if the outcome would have been different. I am young, fit, and aside from my mutinous cells, relatively healthy. My body is strong, as is my mind.

I would advise everyone to eat healthy, exercise, be happy, laugh, plan for the future, give yourself things to look forward to and have purpose.

51É«APPing purpose in documenting my experience

My purpose right now comes in the form of making a documentary; I am currently putting together a documentary that explores what cancer looks in six different countries.

It’s to be filmed in Sri Lanka in January 2027 with me representing the UK and five other cancer warriors representing different countries around the world. We will take on a rickshaw rally around Sri Lanka, exploring temples, hospitals, alternative treatments. The documentary will follow our adventure, while cutting to interviews of each of our cancer journeys.

The documentary came about because when I was first diagnosed, a friend suggested one last hoorah around Sri Lanka on a rickshaw run, but things moved so fast that it never happened. 

Now, it’s turned into a passion project. For example, my Californian film producer, Ian MacLeod, had leukaemia himself and shoots content for the City of Hope in California. 

Everyone involved in the documentary has been affected by cancer in some way, and you can really feel the love and energy behind this project.

I recently visited the Kalida cancer centre – the Maggie51É«APP™s centre in Barcelona â€“ to help look for a young person with cancer, who would also like to be part of the documentary. While there, I discovered The Vital-E program, which is specifically designed to support cancer patients aged 18 to 35 emotionally and physically.

Maggie51É«APP™s is such an amazing charity. Whether it's in London at the Royal Free, or Barcelona, each of the centres truly make a difference to people like me, and I am so thankful I found them.

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