Campaigner Deborah James has opened up about her bowel cancer diagnosis as part of Lorraine’s ‘No Butts’ campaign.
Deborah, who is living with stage four bowel cancer and has been described by Lorraine Kelly as the driving force behind the ‘No Butts‘ campaign, is currently at the Royal Marsden hospital in London, where Lorraine visited her last month.
Lorraine asked how she was feeling.
“Fragile”, Deborah said. “I’m wearing makeup and I’ve brushed my hair, which in a weird way is progress, to be honest with you. Three weeks ago, I couldn’t get myself out of bed to go to the toilet, I couldn’t stand up.”
“We nearly lost you,” said Lorraine. “It was really bad, we were really worried. Again, though, you defy all the odds.”
Deborah explained: “A couple of times this year. If I’m being honest, I don’t really know how I’m alive. This year has been really crazy. I’ve spent about 80 percent of this year in hospital in some capacity. In January, I had a very scary experience where I had a varicose bleed. I thought that was it.
“I can only now talk about it without crying. In a split second, I went from living to thinking that I wouldn’t get through the night. And none of my family did. My body is tired. I have lived with bowel cancer for over five years, which is amazing. But had my cancer been caught early, I wouldn’t be living on a knife edge.
“So for me, the ‘No Butts’ campaign is all about just catching things early, because we know that when cancer is caught early, it’s really curable. We want people to not be embarrassed to talk about anything when it comes to poo.
“I’m going to get through this and I’m going to do it in a way that I feel positive about it. I find wearing bright colours just makes you feel a little bit better.”
Deborah gave this message to viewers:
“Trust your gut. Don’t ever feel like you’re wasting somebody else’s time, especially not a GP’s time. I wish that I had pushed and pushed and pushed six months earlier. Just gotta remember to trust your gut. There’s No Butts about it!”
On today’s show, Lorraine added:
“It was so great to see her because we’ve not been able to see her because she’s been very weak but her inner strength is astonishing and she’s doing better every single day. I know she’ll be watching this morning – Deborah, we love you and we can’t wait to see you in here where you belong, talking about your campaign.”
To watch the interview and show in full visit itv.com/hub. Lorraine airs weekdays at 9am on ITV
