We all know something about breast cancer – the operation, some radiotherapy, maybe some chemotherapy, often years of tablet-taking afterwards. There's a wealth of online info about what happens to you physically. But no-one actually tells you what it does to you mentally and how it affects your day-to-day life. Here, in Su Candy's exclusive online diary, no details are spared. So be warned – it isn't for the faint-hearted. Find out what really happens to you with chemo, meet up with some colourful characters on the way and be inspired and maybe moved by the sad and funny account of her story.


Friday June 13

It's Friday the 13th, still I'm not the superstitious kind, so the only thing I don't like about today is the fact that I have been asked to go for the usual breast screening in the mobile unit.

Is it really three years since the last one? Time slips by so quickly I can hardly believe it. Is it worth going, I ask myself? Such a nuisance. I'll have to go straight to work from there, too, and you're not supposed to put deodorant on.

It would be a hot day, wouldn't it? I'll just slick a bit on, it won't matter, or perhaps I just won't go. No, that would be silly, after all you don't get much for free these days and it's not that much bother. My colleagues and I have been joking about this for days. No, I'm going to go.

It is hot in the mobile van but I'm duly compressed by the cheery (let me know if it hurts) nurse and out almost before I know it. "We'll send you the results," they happily say. Yeah, yeah, whatever, I'm not too worried - no-one in our family has ever had cancer. I walk off feeling rather virtuous and slightly smug!

Thursday June 19

Postman arrives. On the mat is the familiar NHS envelope with my name spelt wrongly – why do they do that? – I have said I am not Mrs S.I. Candy.

I can see from the look of it that is not the "one sheet everything is OK", kind of letter and curse myself for putting that deodorant on!

Vanity is a downfall, my mother used to say. Damn, I bet I'll have to go back and endure the squeeze again, well, serves me right. I open the letter and sure enough, there it all is.

A standard send-out about being recalled and not to worry etc etc and if you want to bring a relative etc etc. Well, I don't really and I don't really want to go back, either.

Still if you've done the crime then serve the time, so I will go back but I'm annoyed at myself. I tell my husband Alan and daughter Laura, both of whom are slightly concerned, but I wave it aside airily with my usual confident "It'll be all right" thing.

For a couple of days I don't really tell anyone but during our pre-work lunchtime gossip I tell the girls about my recall. They all rally round with the words that you want to hear and I'm happy to believe it will all be fine.

I tell my best friend that evening and we have a girly talk for a while about it all and we're both fairly confident that it's just to be sure and that I really shouldn't have worn that deodorant! I really don't give it that much more thought. The appointment fits in nicely with the day and I will leave it at that.

Thursday June 26 – The Longest Day

This is THE day. I haven't even marked it on the calendar. We're due to go off on holiday on Monday and I've been really busy organising and helping Laura with her college work which, through no fault of her own, she is badly behind with.

It has been a terrible burden for her and I've promised unlimited help with what little knowledge I have of biology (none), but at least it's support for her.

Alan has said he will take me to the Luton & Dunstable Hospital breast clinic, so I won't have the worry of parking (and paying!) and Laura can carry on working while I'm gone. It's all organised – like the rest of my life, it is planned and ordered for maximum convenience and usage of time!

Alan does overkill on the timing and I end up arriving half hour too early – there's not much to do around the hospital so I might as well go in.

We have already decided that Alan will not come in with me. It is a busy day at work and he has a lot to prepare as he's off next week and I am a big girl.

So the only thing I do not like is the fact that I am going to have my breasts squeezed again and maybe if the picture isn't clear, run on to the ultrasound scenario. Plus I'm not very good without any clothes on me. I feel completely self conscious in a swimsuit, never mind topless!

Oh well, let's get it over with. I have to ting the bell at reception, it's one of those ones you see in Fawlty Towers and I half expect Basil to pop up from behind the counter.

I try not to giggle to myself as everyone around me is looking quite serious. "Have some respect," I think. "Some of these people might get terrible news today."

The receptionist glides out serenely from the office area and I announce I am very early. She ticks off my name and then asks where my "relative" is.

I want to say that both my parents are dead, although I do seem to speak to my mother and father on a daily basis if only to chide them for certain things, then I remember that it's probably my husband she's thinking of.

Bringing myself back to the matter in hand I reply that I haven't brought him along. She gives one of those "Oh dear, you were told" looks, then picks up my file (why does it look so full?) and ushers me into the changing area.

"Take off all your top garments and keep them with you," she says, indicating a BhS-type net basket. I'm not putting my undergarments in there, I think, and I duly stuff them into my capacious handbag, along with my bright pink top and I put on the short blue wrap-around.The waiting begins.

Actually, even though I'm very early I am immediately called in by the nurse doing the mammogram. Great, I'm going to be in and out before Alan even gets back to work, I think.

An extremely efficient radiographer beckons me into her lair and I am confronted by an enormous machine with more attachments than a spider has legs.

Crikey – I think of my poor breast and send a message to my mother on the other side saying I bet she was glad this hadn't been invented in her day.

The efficient lady has stuck an X-ray of a breast on the light plate, looked at it for a moment and then asked to be excused to fetch a larger plate!

She is gone a few minutes and in my boredom I decide to look at the X-ray that I naively think must be someone else's. It has a largish white blob clearly visible right deep behind what looks like the nipple.

I am shocked and think this poor woman has some not nice news to come, although of course it could be a cyst – temporarily trying to be being Connie Beecham in Holby City.

I look at the writing and my heart does a double beat – it says Candy and carries my date of birth. I feel that awful feeling you get when you know for certain that something bad is about to happen.

A sort of seizing up of the stomach and freezing of the brain with a mild panicky feeling where you feel slightly sick. I speak to mother again telling her this cannot be right, what's happening here, why didn't I bring my relative and could she possibly step in here a moment as I really need my mum!

Miss Efficiency comes back bearing two plates (large ones!). I dare not ask her, partly because I'm not sure I want to know but mainly because she will know I looked and she has obviously had a sense of humour by-pass and most importantly she is about to impart torture to me!

There is much "arranging" of my breast tissue on the X-ray plate and I feel like a piece of Don Millers bread dough handled by the work experience boy.

I try to make conversation but it doesn't go too well and we are reduced to her one-liners of "I am going to tighten this a little more" "does that hurt?" and "breathe in and out and now hold it".

Don't be silly, I think, I can't breathe at all and speaking has been reduced to a whimper. I'm not sure whether I want to cry or not. I want some answers, yet I don't and I really hope I don't have to ask this lady.

Somehow I know I am going to be passed on to the next stage, especially as two further sessions with the dough machine follow and again I have to wait.

They are obviously targeting a certain point as all sorts of special bits are being fitted on and off and twisted this way and that. It finishes and I am ushered dazed and confused back to the waiting area where I try to assimilate all this.

Let's be sensible, I will not panic and assume the worst. It is very hot in the room even though I am only wearing a wrap gown on top. I have not worn deodorant, I am very thirsty and the other occupants in the room are all guzzling water from bottles – I have got one but my body won't work.

My arms have become useless, my legs are jellified and my brain is trying to be somewhere else. Two other ladies are chattering away in Polish, she obviously brought her friend, the wheelchair lady has her husband and there are a few more couples scattered here and there.

My brain switches off – what can I do, read, drink, think – no don't think, whatever you do don't think – not yet, leave that for now. I sit there for a very long time and everyone around me disappears with waves, smiles and thank you's to the staff. Hello everyone, remember me?

See the second part of the series next week.