Life after breast cancer: three survivors' stories In July 2009 a diagnosis of breast cancer blew all that apart. "I had two lumps - one under my arm and one under my breast," she says. "I remember the sorrowful look on the consultant's face when she told me it was cancer and my mum, who was with me, bursting into tears and saying, "Why isn't it me?" It was crisis, shock and horror, like being whisked up in my own tornado. Loncraine gave up her rented home in Oxford and moved back to her parents" farm for a gruelling year of treatment - chemotherapy, surgery, radiotherapy and Cat scans to see if the cancer had spread. Thankfully, it hadn't. But when she emerged there was no question of returning to her old life. She simply wasn't the same. Few women are after breast cancer, though it's not something we tend to dwell on. We focus on the familiar narrative: the discovery of the lump; the shock of the diagnosis; the horror of the chemotherapy. It's assumed that the happy ending is "life returning to normal." In fact, that's barely ever possible - but many times, life can get better. Dr Rachel Naomi Remen, an oncologist for over 30 years and author of the bestselling book Kitchen Table Wisdom: Stories That Heal, has seen how the illness forces us to stop in our tracks. "We all anchor our identity in our daily lives and work... "I am a lawyer," "I am a wife,"" she says. Often, we espouse values that are unexamined, we do things out of habit and not out of conviction. When cancer comes, we're no longer able to fulfil those roles and we're stripped of what we do. Cancer can shuffle our values like a deck of cards. Sometimes the card we carried at the bottom of our deck turns out to be the top card, the thing that really matters. This was true for Loncraine. "I remember a friend saying, "You'll soon be back to your old self," and knowing it just wasn't possible," she says. That whole narrative, the old assumption that my life would follow a simple path that I could control, had been taken away. She wasn't sure she could write again - her illness had rendered her almost speechless: "For the past year I'd been unable to talk about what was happening, I couldn't even cry sometimes. I had no idea what to do next. One day, in April 2011, out walking with two friends, Loncraine passed the Black Mountains Gliding Club. She found herself booking a lesson for the next day. "I needed something new, something big and intense," she says. I wanted to live boldly as it might not be for very long. That first flight was unforgettable: "I wondered what on earth I was doing, but, as we lifted into the air, this big breath came out. Up in the sky there was enough space to grieve and experience emotion. I could cry and feel intense joy, then leave it all up there. I came down with a massive smile on my face - and booked another [lesson]. Spring and summer were spent airbound. "Gliding is unpowered," says Loncraine. You have to let nature lift you, trust invisible forces. Sometimes you're thrown around - but all this now felt right to me. Cancer showed me that I was a tiny thing in a big world. Each flight was an experience of real joy and bliss. She began writing about flying, and is now working on a book. It gave me inspiration, another language. She moved to a rented chapel on the edge of the airfield. She has learnt to take off, soar and land, and has given talks about flying to organisations supporting people with cancer. But her only ambition is to keep enjoying each and every day. It's the kind of transformation that Debra Horsman, programme manager at The Haven, a breast cancer support centre in Leeds, has seen many times. "Breast cancer is a massive wake-up call," she says. For a start, it makes you think what may have caused it, looking at diet, lifestyle and stress. That may lead you to change your career or end your marriage. It's often assumed that it's the man walking out because he can't cope - but the number of times women have said to me, "I've put up with him for so long. Not any more!"" Survivors also want to enjoy every moment. "It doesn't matter if you're 24 or 85, we all have things we want to do," says Horsman. One of our ladies is in her late sixties and has recently started to drive so she can make the 100-mile round trip to see her grandchildren. I recall a successful head teacher writing her resignation letter from her hospital bed and buying a Ferrari on her way home! Valerie Yates also decided to leave a stressful job, as director of marketing and board member of a college, after her breast-cancer diagnosis in 1997. She was 49, the mother of two children aged 11 and nine. "It's the usual story," she says. Holding down a job, doing up a home, raising a family, chairing the board of governors at the local comprehensive. Many women do it - but it took its toll on me. It was only in hospital that I realised how exhausted I was. After the massive shock of the diagnosis, I felt delighted to be able to lie down for a week. Yates stayed off work as long as possible. "Being away from the office helped me see how stressful it was, how unhealthy - and how much I hated my boss," she says. Life was too short to spend it somewhere like that. Yates left her job and took on freelance contracts. But this was just the start. In 2000 she married the father of her children, David. "He'd asked before but I was fiercely independent, and didn't agree with patriarchy and taking someone's name," she says. Cancer made me re-evaluate. I realised there was a personal relationship to think about. I'd found a good man and an excellent father. What was I waiting for? More change followed as Yates explored alternative therapies, meditation and personal development. "I suppose, when you stop seeing yourself as immortal, you ask, "What am I going to do for the rest of my life that will have meaning?" " One day, on being asked when she was "truly happy," Yates replied, "When I'm at home, with people gathered round my table, enjoying themselves." From this came the germ of an idea. She decided to turn her house into a wellness B&B. In 2007, 10 years after her diagnosis, Yates and her husband opened their family home, a large Victorian terrace in Chiswick, west London, to guests. "I had a very clear vision," she says. Allergy-free, uncluttered, non-toxic paints, air and water filters in every bedroom, no TVs in the bedrooms - and conversation and community. We make our own muesli but this is much more than just healthy breakfasts. It's part of our lifestyle. I'm passionate about it and so much happier. If I hadn't had cancer, I'd be retired by now and absolutely worn out. Instead, I've got a sustainable business and so much energy! I love every minute. For Jayne Whitcher, 48, breast cancer gave her and husband, Wayne, the final push to leave Lancashire and move to the Scottish Highlands. "We'd had the dream since we married in 1998," says Whitcher. We spent our honeymoon touring Scotland and had read about Torridon, a village on the west coast. When we got there, we found this wonderful place. We got to know the locals who showed us how to find otters, golden eagles. We went back every year. When Amy, our daughter, was born, we took her on the first opportunity. Although they talked often of moving there, it never quite happened. Both were born and bred in Lancashire, with parents and siblings nearby. "Each time we went, we'd look at properties, make plans - then we'd get home, go back to work," says Whitcher. Wayne had a job as a mechanic and I was a social worker with a 60-mile commute. Dinner needs doing, then it's Amy's homework. You're back in the humdrum. Her breast cancer diagnosis at the age of 40 changed all that. "When the treatment was over, after my reconstruction, we thought, "Now is the time. If we don't do it now, we never will."" This time, the couple advertised for work on Gumtree, their friends in the Highlands sent local magazines and job listings. They followed every lead until Wayne found work as a gamekeeper. The family moved in March 2007. They now live in the Cairngorms National Park in a keeper's cottage surrounded by woodlands, and keep pigs, guinea fowl, bantams and peacocks. Whitcher works for a local charity in a community hospital and can see roe deer from her office window. "We absolutely love it here," says Whitcher. The views are spectacular, the air is so fresh, it's peaceful and tranquil - everything we hoped for and more. Cancer has a massive impact on your life - but it can be in a positive way. I don't think we'd ever have made it here without it. For more inspiring stories, or to share your own, visit breastcancercare.org.uk/mfgallery