I was diagnosed in 1999 with inflammatory breast cancer and was not given a very good prognosis. I was a single parent and my son had been married one month earlier, so I was on my own.
I was, as we all are, devastated to say the least. A good friend and support person confided in her friend Graeme. He was touched by her sadness and thought if this is how she was feeling, how must Michelle be feeling? So he came around to offer his support as a friend, should I ever need it.
As it turned out we became very good friends and good support for each other. Over time this friendship turned into love. Graeme was advised against getting involved with me by one of his friends and a family member because I may die. This hurt me deeply, although I could understand their concerns. Graeme responded by saying he could get hit by a bus and die before me, so he wasn't going to live his life worrying about what might happen..
This beautiful man stood by me every step of my treatment - during chemo, a mastectomy, more chemo and then radiotherapy, a blood clot in my lungs and everything else that went wrong. Not once did his support, loyalty and love falter.
Graeme told me that going to all my treatments and seeing all the other cancer patients, only helped him realise that we were not alone and there were a lot of people worse off because they had no one to support them. Some people had actually lost their partners, because their partner could not cope. He never contemplated leaving. In fact he asked me to marry him.
I know how very lucky I am to have Graeme in my life. My life is completely different since my diagnosis; the only thing that is still the same is I still work as a nurse. Every other aspect has changed for the better. Breast cancer has given me a life that is so happy and fulfilled, which I will not take for granted. I honestly believe the love and support I get from my husband is what made the difference to how my health is today. As Graeme says, he fell in love with me, not my body.
--Michelle
