Daffodil Day: Cork woman who lost husband to cancer won't let her own diagnosis hold her back

Julie, 57, who will stage her 10th Strictly Cobh Dancing event next weekend days after she undergoes chemotherapy in her latest battle with cancer, said she decided to tell her story to offer hope to others.

“I don’t want cancer to define me or my life,” she said. “It’s been a roller coaster since my diagnosis in 2015, there is no denying that, but treatments are getting better, and more and more people are living with cancer.

“You can live with it. We have never let it stop our lives. We’ve just created our lives around it.

I’m back in chemo next Thursday and I plan to just get on with it. Chemo won’t stop me from being there next weekend for our 10th Strictly.

Julie was diagnosed with bowel cancer in 2015, while her husband, Eamonn, was living with a cancer diagnosis, and following surgery and chemotherapy, she was given the all-clear in 2016.

But the couple was devastated in 2020 when Julie’s cancer returned. She underwent two major surgeries, and more chemotherapy.

During one of her medical stays in Dublin, Eamonn's health began to fail and doctors ensured Julie got home to be with him in his final moments. He died in 2021, aged just 63.

Julie said: “The lesson I learned from Eamonn is not to wait. If you have dreams, ambitions, you should go after them.” 

And that’s what she’s been doing for over a decade.

With encouragement from Eamonn, Julie was among those who took to the floor for the first Strictly Cobh Dancing event in 2015.

A year later, she and a friend, Hayley Gould, who was also in the first show, formed the Glitz Dance and Cabaret Group, which has been staging various performances and the Strictly event annually ever since.

Friends in Glitz said despite the challenges Julie has faced, she and Hayley continued to choreograph and run it over the last decade.

“Her perseverance and dedication are a true inspiration," one pal said.

Julie paid tribute to her consultant, Professor Derek Power, her GP Dr Harry Kelleher, her daughter, Leah, son Sean, her family and wide circle of friends for “always having my back”, and said if her story offers hope to just one person, then it will have been worth it.

“A cancer diagnosis is a huge kick in the teeth, there is no doubt about it. And the disease does kill people,” Julie said. “But everyone is different and the treatments today are so much more advanced than even just a few years ago.

“I would encourage people to work with their GPs and oncologists, and to think about what they want to get from life, and then get up and go. Chemo is rough, but on your good days, I would urge people to get out and get going.

“I decided I wasn’t going to lie down to it, and that the good days were going to be great days, and I went after whatever dreams and ambitions I had. Eamonn would always say if you do that, then at least then you can say you tried.” 

Daffodil Day will help the Irish Cancer Society raise some of the €30m it needs to raise annually to provide supports and fund life-changing cancer research.

Its CEO Averil Power said around 44,000 people in Ireland will hear the words ‘you’ve got cancer’ this year, with one in two Irish people expected to receive a cancer diagnosis in their lifetime.

“We want to be there to provide our free services and support for every single one of those people," she said.

Last year, the society gave over 6,000 nights of palliative nursing care or end-of-life care to more than 1,700 patients, while its transport service, which brings patients to and from cancer treatment across the country, saw a 20% increase in bookings.

Also, its free nationwide counselling service saw an 8% increase to over 16,000 sessions, and its freephone support line also saw an 8% increase in contacts to 10,700, with a further 17,300 conversations taking place in its Daffodil Centres nationwide.