Fanny McPhee

Hello, I'm Carolyn Van Beers and today we are doing a very special show, a show about cancer. Where do I even begin? I've honestly written the intro to this show about 13 times and I still have no idea how to start. So maybe I should just start with its real beginning. And that was an Instagram post from Mr. Gok1one about his dearly loved friend, otherwise known as Fanning McPhee. He wrote, I met this pain in the behind Fanning McPhee a few years back when we worked together on a fashion campaign in Australia. I was the face of the brand and she was my campaign manager. We instantly clicked over many a late night, laughing, drinking, playing poker and listening to old school house music. A few years ago she returned to London to start the next chapter of her life. Bagging a flashy job and chic central London apartment. Life was good. Then last year, whilst sat in my car, she told our dear friend and I she had discovered a lump in her breast. We instantly told her to get it checked out. She did and it turned out to be breast cancer. After a mastectomy and a year of chemo and radiotherapy, the specialist found a small stage four tumor in her bones. And on top of that, she discovered that she was losing her job and her working visa, so would need to return back to Australia. In short, this woman has been through what feels like every war the universe could throw at her. Yet yesterday we sat in Paris completing a bucket list drop off, laughing at stupid Facebook named lyrics, turning our cheeky heads at all the hot guys that walked past, and I even nearly convinced her to take a motorised scooter to dinner. In the last 18 months, I've seen how important life is. No matter how much shit it throws at you, every second should be lived like a year. And when in doubt, get on that scooter because if you fall off, someone will help you up. It still chokes me. That and that was the Instagram post that moved me. So much so that I got in contact with Gok because I wanted to interview this amazing woman, Fanny McPhee, and I wanted to know more about her story and tell it and hopefully give some strength and courage to other women living with big life challenges. Alison, her real name, came straight back to me and said that she would not only like to share her story, but raise awareness of living with cancer. We both definitely want to give full coverage, full insight into those experiences that you go through when you're going through cancer. So we're going to tell her story and we're also going to talk about what she has had to do to get through this. We're going to talk about how to talk to people who have cancer. And later on in the show, Alison wants to share how to get through the cancer process. So, Alison, welcome to the show and thank you so much for coming into the studio and talking to us today. Thank you for inviting me in. Yeah. So it means a lot to you to do this show, doesn't it? You were quite, you know, when I got in contact, you were quite keen to share your story. What is it? I find it really important because one in eight women will get breast cancer. So that means for us as women, we need to know how to talk to our friends about this. We need to understand the importance of getting checked and knowing that there's a full network of people out there to help and support you. And what is or isn't available because it's completely changes your life. And you have got stage four cancer, which we're going to talk about in a minute. And that is terminal, isn't it? Yes, it will one day. I will die of breast cancer. At the moment, it's about living with an incurable cancer and all of the things that that throws up. And it's very interesting. Okay, now, we're going to do your story with with cancer in a few minutes, but I want to know, first of all, who is Alison? Okay, well, I'm 52, born in Australia. I was married to a Brit for 25 years. So I've lived between London and Australia for about 30 years. Okay, so when you got married, you lived in England? Yep. Right? Yep. Had a child, had a son, moved back to Australia because I wanted to raise him in an Australian lifestyle. Then, you know, I'm very fickle. So I got bored and decided to come back to London again. And we've done that about four times. You and your husband? Yep. Okay. And then in 2014, there were no. There wasn't any job opportunities that were really exciting to me in Australia. I work in advertising and publishing and I decided to come over to London. So the two of us came over to London and a year later we separated. And I was reaching the halfway mark in my life. I was coming up to 50, and I was just looking at how I lived my life and I thought, I love this man dearly, but I'm not in love with him. And so we separated and my career and my life started to evolve into where I thought I wanted it to be. But because I was separated from My British husband. I then lost my visa to a spousal visa to be able to live and work in the uk. So my bosses kindly, you know, suggested that I find a position where I can get a sponsorship visa and I went through that process and it's quite hard going and what I do is very specialized. So found a visa, got a position. Everything was going along merrily and I just come back into the country with my sponsorship visa in my hand and three months later I was diagnosed with breast cancer. And what job were you doing at the time? You said you had an exciting. Yeah, I was the managing director of a commercial division of a publishing company that predominantly worked with luxury fashion brands and streetwear brands for a youth title. It's a youth title, so it was amazing. Worked with the best brands, the best creators, photographers, directors, up and coming models. It was incredible and in the most creative environment I'd ever worked in. And I was very happy and they felt like my family. So life was amazing. Life was great. I had a beautiful apartment in central London in a mews, you know, I was out dancing and drinking and partying. I had an incredible group of friends. You were single again? I was single again and dating. That's very weird after 25 years. But yeah, just living life and trying to figure out who I was as a 50 year old woman and I think it's a very pivotal time for women. My son at that time was about 25 and he was living in Australia. He was fully supportive of me doing my thing and I felt really alive and was searching for my happiness. What was my happiness? Gosh, okay, so surrounded by lots of friends, presumably. What. How did you. Where were you when you found. Okay, so the thing about breast cancer, my older sister had had breast cancer about seven years ago now and had survived it and I was very aware of being checked, so I was being checked. When I lived Australia, every year I would have a mammogram. But when I came over to the uk, I kind of slipped off that a little bit because I was in a different medical system. But I found a lump in my right breast and went to my gp. The gp. I mean, she didn't even have to feel it. She said, with your history, family history, we're going to send you straight to have a mammogram. NHS where I was living didn't have any appointments free in the two week period that they have to see you. So they sent me private. I went to a private clinic in Harley Street, I saw a consultant, I had a mammogram had an ultrasound. And the minute they started ultrasounding me, I knew, because just the way they stop, you know, they start measuring. He had said to me, I won't, you know, you'll come back in a week's time and see the consultant then and you'll get your results. He went out of the room. He had said his goodbyes and then came back in five minutes later, obviously just looked at the mammogram and then sent me off to see the consultant straight away. And I knew, and in fact, I was very pragmatic about it. I knew that I had always felt that it might be on the cards for me because my sister had had breast cancer and we're very similar. And so when she told me, I wasn't that surprised. Okay, so we're going to talk a little bit more about your journey, because that was just the beginning, wasn't it? That was just the start of you finding a lump and then saying you've got breast cancer. And I have to say, the lump that I found was nothing. The lump that actually turned out to be the cancer was in the left breast. And I had not felt. Was so small that she said, you wouldn't have felt it for at least a year. It was very far back. I was so lucky. Wow. So that's very early detection. Very. And maybe the fact that you had an older sister you had propelled you into getting looked at. Wow. Okay, that's very, very interesting. We're going to talk a little bit more about your first mastectomy that you had in a few minutes time and. And then moving on to the stage four, which is what you're living with at the moment. So you talked about. They said we need to do a mastectomy on you. Is that. Was that something you. Did you feel that you wanted to definitely have a mastectomy, get rid of it? No, I wanted a lumpectomy. I was still, you know, I was dating. I'm single. I didn't want to lose a breast. I didn't want to have to go through that. I'd seen what my sister had gone through. Okay, let me stop you there. We're going to talk more about that in just a few moments time. We're going to take a very short break now, but we are going to come back and talk to Alison and continue. Continue her journey with cancer. And also she has some amazing advice and courage to give you girls. Welcome to women's radio Station. I'm Sarah Louise Ryan, and welcome to Love Lessons Live on Women's Radio Station. Hello and welcome to future Classic Women Awards with me Stefania Passamonte on Women's Radio Station. 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We empower those living in rural areas with media that transforms how they access, own and share information. To find out more and be part of this movement, come check out our website@mediamattersforwomen.org you're listening to women's radio stations supporting women's well being women's radio stations creating a global network for the Empowerment of women. And we want you to be involved. Join us on Instagram and Twitter womensradio station, that's Women's Radio STN or Facebook Women's radio Station to keep up to date with all our exciting programs. Welcome back to Women's Radio Station. We are doing a very special show today talking about cancer with my special guest, Alison. So we were just talking about the first year diagnosis and that they found very small lump in your left breast, is that right? Yeah. And so what happened next? So I'm now back into the NHS system and they found one lump. They think that there's a second and maybe a third. When I had had my original consultation with in the private system, the consultant was very haphazard with how he dealt with me. I think he wanted the big moment where he told me that I had cancer and he prepared his face for me and had the pity face and everything going on. And when I said to him, you know, is it likely to be a lumpectomy? And he said, yes, but you're going to lose your nipple. And it was just so, it was just like, it was like cutting a corn off your toe. That was how he kind of spoke about it. And I saw the breast nurse that was in the room looked at me, she could see how painful it was and it was. That was kind of my introduction to the language around cancer and how people talk about it. So then fast forward a week. I'm into back into the nhs. I see my surgeon for the first time. She suspects that there's more than one tumor. I have some more biopsies done and they know that there's some activity in my lymph nodes as well at the same time. So can I just rewind so I can tell from the way you were just talking, that was quite upsetting the way you were told. Yeah, well, our breasts are so. They've got so many dimensions to them. For us as women, you know, they're part of our sexuality, they feed our children. You know, it's all to do with our body, confidence, you know, and when someone says, literally, well, you know, we're going to cut, you'll lose your nipple and just be so matter of fact about it. That's harsh. It's really harsh. And as a single woman, you know, you start to feel that you're gonna be disfigured. And how are you gonna live with that? You know, on top of that, I'm a plus size woman. And so I've had to live my life and figure out who I am physically in a world that says that you should be a certain body type. And I had come a long way with that and, you know, obviously with my relationship with Gok, you know, he had helped me through all of that. And this felt like it was gonna be a massive step back. When I'm faced with, you know, am I having a lumpectomy or am I having a mastectomy? I'm pushing for the lumpectomy because I'm thinking I'm going to look the most normal like that. Let's just clarify for anyone else who doesn't know. So a lumpectomy is when they just take out the cancer. They take out the cancer and the margin tissue around it to make sure that there are no cells in the normal tissue. And a mastectomy is when they take out the whole breast. Yeah. Which you were saying earlier that you found it quite interesting that with women they tend to just cut things off. Yeah. Women's cancers, it seems a fairly male response to it. We're just going to just lop it off. And I just noticed that with cancers to do with men, that doesn't really happen. There is some changes happening in the NHS or I'm starting to notice or see more women who are having chemotherapy before surgery to reduce the size of the tumour and therefore perhaps get them to a point where they can have a lumpectomy rather than a mastectomy. And I think that's really positive because it's about, you know, preserving as much of the breast as possible. And, you know, you've just been given this life changing information and then to be told in a derogatory and kind of slightly hurtful way that. And you're not gonna look very pretty at the end of it. It's just really. It's not the right way to go around. No. So you were giving this information, but you were then told you could not have a lumpectomy. Yeah. So it turned out that there were two tumors, there was a third that they were pretty sure was growing, and then there were five other areas where the tissue was in transition. So she said, you know, my breast surgeon said, we can chase these around your body for the next couple of years. It would be best if you had a mastectomy. And I was gutted. But, you know, the whole process of having cancer and going through treatment is you make thousands of decisions and you are as informed as you can be. And so I took the information on board and, you know, I wanted to survive. And vanity wasn't going to get in the way of that. And I. Okay, then let's have a mastectomy. Right. So now I've got that settled, then she says we can't do a reconstruction at the same time because I've got psoriasis. My skin is not as healthy as other people's skin. They didn't know if I would heal well. And obviously post surgery, they need to get you into chemo and radio as quickly as possible. A reconstruction, meaning put in a new breast. So you're just going to be left with just flat, flat on one side with no nipple, nothing? No. And a G breast on the other side? Yes. A G breast is a large breast, Very large breast. But, you know, they promised me that, you know, at least six months after radiotherapy finished, I would then go into program to have a reconstruction done. So it was just about holding out, you know, for about a year, which was fine. So you had the breast removed? Yep. What was, what was the outcome? So, um, I'm living on my own and I'm figuring out how I'm gonna handle, you know, the post surgery period of about six weeks. So my sister flies over, arrives. The sister has had cancer and she's had both breasts removed and never had them reconstructed. But she is as fierce as fierce can be. Right. And she comes over and she arrives while I'm in surgery and she's there when I wake up and they take me up to the ward and I thought the point at which I look down and my breast isn't there was going to be really difficult because you're told how difficult it is. And in fact. And it might have been the tramadol that was doing this, but I looked down at about, I don't know, two in the morning and there's no dressing on there. And I was really at peace with it. I felt I've done the thing that I have to do. It's gone. I felt my cancer is gone and. Right. Let's just now get well enough to start chemo and move forward. Yep. And how long after did you start the chemo? I think it was somewhere around six weeks. So you're really. Now this has taken over your life, hasn't it? Yeah, it's like a job. Yeah, it really is. The appointments, the consultations, educating yourself, keeping yourself well and away from people that might have. I mean, were you poorly? No, I was really good, actually. I think considering that you've had a whole breast removed. I had drains, so they were removed after a period of time. And I did really well and I recovered well. And in fact, it was a really almost joyous time for me. I was with my sister. I had had the pre surgery period with all of the scanning and everything else going on I was doing with my friend here. But my family were on the other side of the world and I really needed them and I could talk to them each morning and each night, and I did. And so I had all this time with my. My sister was with me for three weeks. We had all this time together and it was actually a really joyous time. So you've done the chemo? Yep. And then you did radio? Yep. And so what happened next? So I finished my radiotherapy August of last year. And also. Can I just interrupt? They told you 83% chance, they give you these stats, they put your tumor into a computer and it spits out a percentage, your prognosis percentage. Mine said that with all the treatment that I'd had, I had an 83% chance of surviving to 10 years or beyond. And I thought, oh, they're cracking stats. And in my job, I deal with a lot of statistics. Lot of, you know, it's something that I understand and I can put it in context. And I'm very pragmatic person. So my 83, I was like, yeah, I like that. 83%. That's good. That's a good one. So I finished my radiotherapy and I've worked throughout my treatment about 50% of the time, and I come into work and I get made redundant. Whoa. And that was. And this is the job where they're giving you a visa? Yes. To stay here. Yeah. So when I lose my job, I lose my right to live and work in the UK and I've got 60 days to leave the country or find another job where someone will sponsor me. Well, I'm just. I'm so weak from the treatment. I can't even envisage, first of all, going through a job interview and then, you know, getting through that first three or six months probationary period and proving yourself. I just didn't have that kind of energy. So I decided that it was time for me to just stop fighting the fight to stay in the uk, which was where my whole life was really. And I needed to go home. So I packed all my stuff up, I moved into a friend's house, I gave myself five more weeks in London, where I was going to see everyone and do everything I wanted to do. And throughout the process of my treatment, I had been being scanned for something they'd seen on My liver and something they'd seen in my lung, and that was from the original diagnosis. They weren't terribly concerned about it, they were just keeping an eye on it because breast cancer metastasizes into the bones, liver, lungs and brain. And they had seen this thing and they were just kind of tracking it. So I rang up my nurse and I said, look, I've lost my visa, I have to leave the country. She said, let's move forward your CT scan date for your lung and let's just do a last scan on it, give you the all clear on that. You can go home with that information. Yeah. So you're thinking cancer free? Possibly, and I'm going to start a new life back in Australia. Yeah. Because, you know, when you go through treatment, it's all about getting through the treatment at the end of it, you know, with an 83%, well, I'm cured as far as I'm concerned. The doctors haven't said that, but that's what you believe. So when I went in to get my last appointment with my oncologist or with the radiotherapist and they gave me the results and they said, we've seen something in your bones. We think you have a metastasis in your sternum and that is stage four. That's stage four. So you're now just about to go back to Australia, but have been given that bombshell that you now have stage four cancer, which is terminal. Yep. Wow. Yeah, the universe. The universe was very generous with me. Goodness me. We're going to come back just after these short breaks and talk more about stage four. Welcome to the women's radio station supporting women's well being. 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We give practical help to get people back on track. Whether you're thinking of having a baby, trying to get out of an unhappy relationship, or just unsure what benefits you may be entitled to, we can help. Visit turntous.org.uk welcome to the Women's Radio station supporting women's well being. Women's Radio Station can give voice to your brand. With a wide range of sponsorship opportunities, including individual programs, we can tailor your experience for you. For more information on how you can sponsor a Show, go to womensradiostation.com Women's radio station supporting women's well being. Welcome back to our special show we're doing here on Women's Radio Station about cancer. And we're talking to Alison. She was just telling us her story. And Alison, you were just about to fly back to Australia to begin a new life in Australia and you were told you had stage four. Now tell us a bit more about that. Okay, so breast cancer, when it becomes a secondary cancer, so outside of the breast and outside of the lymph nodes, it appears in your liver, lung, bones or brain. And with my particular type of breast cancer, it mostly goes to the bone first. So I had a small tumour in my sternum that was small and had a lot of scar tissue over it, which meant that the chemotherapy and the hormone therapy that I was on was really working a treatment. It's dormant. I had had a PET scan, it showed no activity which Just meant that there were no fast growing cells. But how that felt, well, I felt completely let down by my body and by the process and the system and everything that I believed, you know, had done, everything that I had to do. Chemo was awful and still it had progressed. That's what I believed. Then, you know, they sent me for a couple more scans and it came back and they said, well, we believe actually that it's been there through the chemo process. So it hadn't, you know, it's not something that had come up after I'd gone through treatment. So, you know, it is terminal. At some point, of course, I asked what my prognosis was because I love a good statistic. And she said to me, well, you're in a group of women who have, we would say have two to five years to live. But she said, you don't have it in any of your organs, it's in the bone, it's small, it's dormant, it's responding to treatment. So you could have 15 years and we just don't know. So the next year is crucial because it's going to be about scanning you every three months, a bone scan and a CT scan, looking for any changes, looking for when it wakes up, not if it will wake up, it will become resistant to the hormone treatment and then you'll be put on different medication and different treatments to fight it. And I left the country with that information. I left my friends and my home and my job, but most importantly, my medical team in the nhs, who I just adored, who I felt had saved my life. Right. And I headed off to Thailand for two weeks, met my sister there and got ready to go home, get a new medical team and kind of start the process again, really. Presumably just get your head around, yeah, this information. Process this information. Yeah, because how can you process the fact that you have an incurable disease? Yeah, well. And I think that the understanding, it is a process in its own right. You start to read things that you shouldn't read, but it's a kind of three steps forward, two back, and in fact, you know, by the time I got home, and I think the break in Thailand was really important because I felt like that kind of flushed it a bit out of my system. I got my energy back, I felt revived and I was ready for the next part of the fight. But it is an incredible roller coaster. And when you start thinking about your end of life or how you want it to be, or even that if it's incurable, how sick am I going to be. And what's life going to be like with that? I mean there's dying but there's also living with something that's pretty nasty. So you, you process it, you just process it. And presumably you went back to where in Australia? You went back to your family home? Yeah, I, well at 52 years of age I moved into my parents retirement home which is very exciting after London. It's a little quiet but it's, you know, kind of interesting. And a retirement home. A retirement home in a retirement village. Wow. Okay, so I'm the youngest person there, but probably racing towards the finish line just as fast. Yeah, yeah. Great feeling. Oh dear. So, gosh, that must have been so hard. It was really hard actually. I thought it was going to, I thought the transition to living there was going to be really difficult and it wasn't. I got home and the place where I come from, Torquay, it's on the surf coast in Australia. It's surrounded by the most beautiful beaches and it's very much a well being place. There are lots of well being and wellness practitioners there and I instantly felt more healthy. I started walking every day with friends, six kilometres every day, up and down cliff walks along the beach and I could feel myself getting stronger. I started to lose weight, my head was in a really good space. I started doing lots of woo woo things. I would try anything. So we did chanting classes, lots of meditation, some moonlight meditation which was very interesting, sound baths, Reiki, kind of dipping into all of that stuff. And you know, although I am very pragmatic and not, you know, so woo woo. What I did get from it was how deeply relaxed I could become. And so it handles my anxiety. I'm quite an anxious person naturally and I just found different systems and processes where I could process the next phase of what was going to happen. It was your way of being able to go, I need to cope with this, I need to manage this. And those alternative therapies almost were really, really helpful because you were saying to me earlier, before we started the show that they don't know why more and more people are getting diagnosed with cancer. But some doctors suspect that it's the anxiety and stress of modern living that is causing the body not to be able to fight when we, when we get these cancers. Basically what it is is that the body is set up with, you know, a chemical system for the fight or flight when we're in fight or flight mode. And we needed that to get away from bears hundreds of thousands of years ago. But we don't need it so much now. But because we live in quite anxious and stressful states in Western society, our bodies are releasing those chemicals. We're being flooded with them all the time. And that is affecting our ability. Well, affecting our cell growth and mutations and our immune system. Yep. And we are more and more people are getting cancers. And you know, one of the key things that my oncologist talks to me about is trying to keep myself in as much of a Zen state as possible and, you know, use tactics that when I get anxious or obsessed or whatever, that I control my breathing so I can get out of the fight or flight mode quicker. So those chemicals are not in my body. Wow. And they really. You really have felt empowered and you feel a lot calmer. Yep. And this is coming from someone who is, you know, a bit of a hard nosed career woman, loves house music and partying. So it's not really my style, but I can feel it. And the more that I do it, the more healthy I feel. Wow. What would you say is the one thing that you turn to, you know, did you do yoga or meditation? I think is probably an exercise. And you know, I'm a plus sized woman. I've never exercised. That's like a dirty word to me. But it is amazing that when you give your body what it needs, how well it responds. So you are now. So this was back in November. Yes. That you found that you were back in Australia with stage four. Yep. What's happening at the moment? So I had to get a new medical team that went through all of the tests again, all the scans and everything else. They measured the metastasis and kind of keeping an eye on it. They've decided not to change my medication. I'm just on tamoxifen, which is working really well. And we are basically waiting to see what's going to happen. And that is really, that is the most difficult thing to deal with because you're having to hold a diagnosis where you know at any point it can switch back on and you're going to go into a raft of different treatments and that it could kill you or not. And after two or 12 years, isn't it? Yep. And you just kind of, you have to just let go a little bit. That's all. Because that's what I wanted to talk about. What is. There's lots of emotions you're probably going through. Loneliness, fear, anger, frustration. Is there an overriding emotion that just, you know, became. Were you very angry? I would say I was more sad than angry. Okay. You know you do get quite massive waves of sadness. But I was really lucky that when I went through treatment last year, I. My sister said to me, the number one thing you need to do is get yourself a therapist. You need someone to talk to, an impartial person that you can't. That you can be whoever you are with. And I did that. And she really taught me some great techniques for how to handle what was going on. Like what? So she. I do a lot of writing now. I never used to write, and now I write and I have a blog and I write about this and I write about it very honestly and with quite a bit of humor. But that helps me process the anxiety and the mad thoughts that are going on in my head. It gets them out of there. It stops the monster from having claws. Yes. And when it's out there, it just doesn't. It doesn't have the teeth that it used to have. And I do that and I feel calmer. And I don't do get into the process of any destructive behavior. And it really works. And it seems to be that you want to share. Yep. And it's important for you to share. Yeah. Because you are going through this. You know, there is that loneliness. But by sharing, does that. Does that. Yeah. Well, the funny thing was that when I was diagnosed, I didn't. I told my friends and I didn't tell anyone else. And I am crazy about social media. So, you know, I can do anything and I'll put it up on social media. One of those people. And I did not tell people that I had cancer. But at the point at which I knew that I was going to lose my hair, I thought, well, it's going to become very obvious because I do like a selfie that something's going on. So I said, I kind of blurted it out. And then this wave kind of happened and supports and love. And I. It kind of changed my head. You know, I thought, wow, human connection, that's actually the way to go. And it's been massive now in my life. For a year, I've been posting about this and I've created these great relationships. Wow. Okay, we're going to take another short break, but we are going to come back and talk a little bit more with Alison. She's got lots of tips to share and lots of advice to give us if you are going through cancer or if you know someone that's going through cancer. We'll see you in a couple of minutes. Welcome to women's radio Station. I'm Sarah Louise Ryan and welcome to Love Lessons Live on Women's Radio Station. Hello and welcome to future Classic Women Awards with me Stefania Passamonte on Women's Radio Station. Hello and welcome to Julie Mae is Listening. Hi, this is Anna Kennedy and we're at Women's Radio Station supporting women's well being and we're talking all things autism women. The possibilities are endless. That's what makes us different. Hi, I'm Falguni Desai of Action Coach. Are you a business owner with more than five employees? Do you want to grow your business? I'm a London based business coach who helps small and medium sized businesses to grow and make a profit. I will help you identify the strengths and weaknesses in your business and then work with you to improve it using a structured framework. To find out more, contact me on 072-16-54640 and book your one hour complimentary one to one coaching session. Thank you. Hi, I'm Tracey Weedon of Brownhill Insurance Group. 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We're a registered charity operating in Sierra Leone and the Democratic Republic of Congo and we produce and share podcasts via Bluetooth on mobile phones focusing specifically on women and girls excluded from information due to extreme poverty. We empower those living in rural areas with media that transforms how they access, own and share information. To find out more and be part of this movement, come check out our website@media mattersforwomen.org you're listening to Women's Radio stations supporting women's well being. Women's Radio Station is creating a Global network for the empowerment of women. And we want you to be involved. Join us on Instagram and Twitter womensradio station. That's womensradio stn or Facebook Women's radio station to keep up to date with all our exciting programs. Welcome back to a special show we're doing here on women's radio station all about cancer. We're here with my guests. Thank you so much again for coming in and talking to us about your journey with cancer. You had stage one cancer, thought you were okay, and then you were told six months ago you now have stage four cancer. Yeah. How are you living your life? Well, I like to think of it as I have three months of all clear. I go in and I get scanned and they say, yes, there's no activity, it's still dormant. We all scan you again in three months. And so I always say to my oncologist, so I have the all clear. And he or she always laughs and says, well, no, not quite, you've still got cancer. But how I like to think of it is at that point, yes, I have cancer, but it's not doing anything. And it's now I've got three months where I get to not think about my cancer and live my life. And for me that means photography, traveling, doing everything that I want to do. It's a funny thing, this journey, because you and this is going to sound a bit crass, but it almost feels a little bit like a blessing because I know that this will kill me at some stage. But for now, I'm really alive and you're being you and I'm being me, authentically me. I only do what I want to do. I do nothing that I don't want to do. And I have the most connected relationships I've ever had. I am the happiest and healthiest I've ever felt. And I get on with getting on and I know I can do that for three months at a time. And then I go and get scanned and every time when you're leading up to the, the scan period, you get terrible anxiety because you think, is this the one where it's going to have woken up and is it in my liver or is it in my lung or my brain now? And you know, that is really the only period in the three month cycle when it hits me. And the rest of the time I prefer to think of myself as being well, but I think I would probably panic. Oh my gosh, I've really got to live every minute. You know, I would be almost how are you not panicking? You do. You are like that originally, are you? Yeah. And I planned a big trip for myself. There was so much stuff I hadn't done. I was so busy with my career and my life, actually. I didn't get on with the living. I was just on the hamster wheel. And so there were things that I hadn't done that I really wanted to do and it was important that I honoured myself by doing them. And so I'm now 10 weeks into a trip where I've been lucky enough to go to Greece and Italy and France and be with all my friends in London. I've done everything that I want to do and I feel really at peace. And I feel that even if when I go back and I have my scan and they say, we're really sorry, but it's progressed. I've done one really big thing that I wanted to do and I'm satisfied with that. And if I'm lucky enough that it hasn't progressed, then I'm going to plan another trip and I'm going to keep on doing that until my savings run out or until I become too ill, because I only have now. I am healthy now and I'm able to, you know, walk around Venice now, so I have to do it now. But the panic of wanting to. Having to do everything that you think you've got to do, that actually eases off a bit and you become much more relaxed with it. I'm very in the moment, I'm very present in my life. And how do you. You say you're eating into your savings, so presumably you're not working now? No, I'm not working. I gave myself a year off. Yeah. They said to me this year would be critical. So it's important for me to do all the things that I want to do, treat my body as kindly as I possibly can and hopefully help my body to stay healthy past this very critical first year and in this Zen state, like I said, to just be in a better place, to be able to cope. Yep. And I wanted to be with my son and my parents and my family, obviously, and just be a bit calmer with life rather than, you know, getting off the Tube, crunching down the road. Gotta get to that meeting. Gotta grab a coffee first. What am I gonna have for lunch? Yeah, I don't. I just don't think like that anymore. I'm just. It's much more easy and calm. That's such good advice for anyone who maybe is going through a similar kind of thing. Or knows anyone who's going through a similar sort of thing. So I did give you homework before we were doing this show, and I said to you, you know, if you had any advice or tips or anything to share with people who are going through a similar thing, a big life challenge, or they know someone who's got cancer, unlike it, like you, it's incurable. What would your. What would your advice be? Okay, so I've got a few. So the jargon around cancer, cancer isn't fluffy and sweet and lovely and we are not warriors and we're not brave and we're not on a journey. There is no deck chair and cocktail at the end of this. It is, you know, it's a bit of an ugly old business. And I think that that jargon, especially when people say to you, oh, you're so brave, it's. That places a lot of pressure on the patient to be brave. And no one needs that kind of pressure. Another thing is that it became really evident quickly is you really need a patient advocate. You need someone who will help work with your breast nurse to schedule things, to look at what you're being told and ask the questions that you're not asking that you just don't have the presence of mind to ask. Your sister was yours. My sister was mine remotely. But then I had another friend here, Tina, who we were close friends. I wouldn't have said we were best friends. We are now best friends. And she has been through everything with me. Everything. And that's so important. Yeah. And she was incredible and completely unemotional throughout the process. Did you think you had a friend because you didn't have family here? Yes. So would family be your first? I think with your family you can be 100% yourself or 99% yourself. With your family, that's harder to do that with friends. I really pined and craved my family while I was going through this. My father was very ill in Australia while I was going through chemo. And, you know, I was told by his doctor that he was going to pass away and I couldn't get to him. So, yeah, really, family's everything. Right? Then another really key thing that I learned was go and find a therapist. Incredible, incredible process. You can be angry and say all the things that you can't say to your family. It's really important. And they don't give you any platitudes. It's platitude free zone. Yeah. You know, around. Another point is around information. Don't get your information from the web, from Blogs from all of those places, especially not while you're in the early phases of your diagnosis and treatment. Wait until you're a bit more of an expert on your disease and then you've got a bit of a thicker skin and you know what your reading is. So basically you're saying you really get your information from the doctors. Absolutely. That early stage. Yes. Yeah, most definitely. Because it will frighten the life out of you. What you can see on the Internet, the statistics, we are not statistics. They're helpful, but they just inform your decision making. And you're either a person who understands them or doesn't, but they are not you. You are a living, breathing human being and you can beat any of those statistics. So just help them. Just let them help you inform your decision making. I mean, we talked about that as well, didn't we? That we were both given stats at quite an important time of our life. And, you know, if you look at me, I'm five foot nine and I'm. We'll have very different stats to someone who's five foot one, maybe a different build, different nationality, you know, all the, you know, stats are just stats, aren't they? Yeah. And if you. Presumably they can make you panic. Yeah, they're very scary. For me, they're empowering because they gave me my boundaries, they let me understand, well, okay, you know, the big decision is about doing chemo for my particular cancer. It's not that helpful, it's not that effective. And so I was a bit borderline and I had to go through a lot of stats to kind of figure out what I want to do and I decided to do chemo. In the end, it turned out to be an absolute blessing because it turned out that I had a metastasis and it worked on that. So, you know, the universe was doing its magic for me. Another great tip is it's a day by day disease. Do not. When you're in that early phase of treatment, don't worry about what the chemo's gonna be like or the radiotherapy. Just handle today, okay? The rest of it is too big. And that is why it's rolled out to you by the nhs. First of all, it's the surgery phase and we're going to just talk about that, we're not going to talk about the other bits and I understand that now, but it's very frustrating when it's happening because you want to know the whole journey. So what would your advice be? Just don't even think about it. Just literally just go. Just Go with the flow. It's just too tempting. Isn't it just? It is, but I think it's actually really destructive and you need to conserve your mental energy. This disease, and as you get more and more into it, is much more a psychological disease than a physical one. Okay, now we're nearly at the end of the show. If you had one thing to give out to anyone who's going through a big journey. Not a journey. Not a journey. You see? Not a journey. How you talk to people is important, a big challenge. What would it be? What's your one thing for people who are dealing with someone in that situation? Don't use the jargon. Take the cues from the language that the person is using. Please don't tell them that they're lucky that you know it's being caught early. There's nothing lucky about cancer. Don't say everything will be all right because it already isn't. Not everyone is going to be a survivor. I won't be a survivor. I'm a thriver. I will not be cured. But I'm going to live with it. I'm going to live with it as long as I can. So you just have to be careful around language. Okay. I just want to say thank you so much for sharing your story with us. If anyone has been listening and they want to follow your blog, have you got your details for. Yeah, my blog is Fanny McPhee with an underscore between the Fanny and the McPhee. With a pH. With a pH. Yes. And I'm on Instagram and on Facebook and yeah, there is a resource. Wow. Well, thank you very much. When are you heading back to Australia? I go back in a week. Okay. We'll have a safe trip. And yes, if you've been touched by any of the information, you can contact me, Carolyn@WomensRadiostation.com or please check out Fanny McPhee on her blog or Instagram. I'll be back with another special show very soon, but thank you for listening to me here on Women's Radio Station and thank you very much for kindly telling us your story. Thank you for having me in. Welcome to the Women's Radio Station Supporting women's well being. Women's Radio Station is all about diversity from opinions, career, ethnicity, education and most importantly, women's well being. We aim to celebrate the individuality of every woman everywhere, providing opportunities and the platform for your voice. Visit our website womensradiostation.com for more information. Hi, I'm Liz Van Linden, a UK travel consultant for He's a mere travel. People come to me as they want unique experiences and a personalized service. This happens from the moment that they inquire till they come back home. I work with luxury tour operators. You can contact me on 078-254-12112 and Liz spelt L I S hazazelmeretravel.co.uk hi, I'm Tamina Zaman, founder of Empower and Enrich. When it comes to money, do you clam up or get confused? Do you wish you could save more money or are you hoping you have enough for retirement? You are not alone. Many women want to be smarter with their cash, but just don't know where to start. @empowerandenrich.org you will find a host of options to help you take charge of your finances and learn how to put your money to work for you in an easy, affordable way. Get in touch with me me@empowerandenrich.org and let's change your future together. Hi, I'm Carolyn Van Beers. Please join me for a brand new show here on women's radio station. It's Mother's Hour. 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