Where I grew up ....

Background....

I was born on a boiling hot Easter Monday April 7th 1969 in a little village called Long Itchington. 

I had a wonderful childhood growing up in such a close knit community with great friends whom I still to this day are happy to say are still good friends. Facebook is a wonderful invention . 

Once I left high school I moved over to Jersey. I knew the island so well as it was our annual family holiday destination from a very young age. 

I met so many new friends. Life was fabulous. I worked during the days and socialised in the evenings. I joined a gym where I met my now ex husband. I trained daily it was my drug, I loved it. I suppose you could call me obsessed.

December 1995 Luke our son was born six weeks early. He’s always liked Christmas. Guess he just didn’t want to wait til January.

We married in 1997 in Jamaica where my mum gave me away. Sadly my dad had passed away in 1990 aged 56y from cancer. I was 21 years old at that time.

Then in 1999 Brandon our second son was born. Then within a month I lost my nan to a stroke. Luckily I had flown home and she had met her great grandson. The year went on and finished on rock bottom. We lost my mum on Christmas Day aged 51y to breast cancer. Nothing prepares you for loosing your mum. She’s the one who is always their, she knows everything and always has the answers. 

My ex husband use to compete in body building competitions and so it seemed natural for me to follow suit with my love of training. So in 2009 I competed in my first show. This went on for six years. My final competition was two days before my mastectomy .

I joined the Police in 2002. Training was in Kent UK for 15 weeks. I found this really hard as we had two boys Luke and Brandon. Brandon had his third birthday two days before I left. I flew home every weekend to see them but it was really hard being away from them.

2006 Kyle our third son came into the world. Well I was truly out numbered now. I had a houseful of boys. 

In 2011 so many events happened. My marriage broke down due to my ex husband having an affair. I found a lump in my left breast but was told by the hospital it was scar tissue and nothing to worry about. I had no idea what scar tissue this was as I had never had any operations. But you assume they are the experts and they know best. I also left my job as a Police Officer and started my own business dog grooming.

2014 I was training hard to compete in the September Figure Fitness category as per usual. I suddenly got terrible pains in my right elbow especially when lifting weights when training and dogs whilst working. It wasn’t like me to visit the doctor but the pain had me in tears. Whilst at the doctors after explaining to me I had tennis elbow and I needed to rest, I happened to say “ Oh I have two lumps now and they are both getting bigger” so much so you could actually see them protruding from my chest wall. My doctor once again measured them agreed they were bigger and again referred me back to the breast clinic. I had actually been back and forth to the breast clinic over the last three years with my original lump each time to just be told its nothing to worry about. Never did they biopsy it. When asked if any family history of breast cancer and I answer yes my mum died from it aged 51y I was told only having one family member isn’t significant enough. Yep your horrified aren’t you?, so was I .

Anyway this was the end of July 2014 the hospital finally decided to biopsy the lumps. Bloody hell its so painful, this really long needle pushing through the layers of skin into the lump. Plus under the armpit to check the lymph nodes. Whether it was because I had minimal fat content as I was only weeks out from competing or its normal but OMG all I can say is it was painful and it hurt. They told me the results would take approx two weeks and I would be contacted.

Within two days I received a phone call to go into the breast clinic. This was the Friday. I was flying to UK to one of my UK Besties for the weekend and returning on the Monday. With this they asked me to attend on the Tuesday August 5th .

Click onto August 5th for the continuation ............