Sheila Hancock on breast cancer: transcript

Janice:Were you working when you found your lump and if so did you try to carry on while you were having treatment? How did you feel when you found out?
Sheila Hancock:Yes, I was filming when I took a shower and felt the lump. I had in fact been having regular mammographies for lumpy breasts which didn't pick up anything. Like many women I've met, I knew instinctively, straight away, that I had cancer before any of the tests that proved it. Obviously I was terrified and shocked. I couldn't believe that my hitherto healthy body had let me down. But after a while I decided I wasn't going to be beaten. I was either going to get better or die well! It's never easy but people do get through it.

Kirstin:When a loved one contracts cancer, apart from dealing with the horror of what they are feeling, there is always the terrible threat of death in the background. Is it best to acknowledge this or not?
Sheila Hancock:The questions you have raised surely apply to life in general. You talk about the threat of death, the fact of death is always in the background, every time you cross the road and the appalling events in New York at the moment demonstrate that. Can I repeat I really believe friends and relatives should carry on as normally as possible. Allow the patient to talk about it if they want to, and not if they don't. I never think it's a bad idea to talk about death. When you get to my age it would be stupid to ignore the fact that it's on the horizon. And somehow it becomes less scary if you look it in the face.