What happens when breast cancer stalks your family and you know there’s a high chance you will suffer from it. Wendy Watson, voted Tesco’s Mum of the Year, took drastic action to avoid that happening and so did her daughter, as they tell Gabrielle Fagan.

IT is evident as soon as you meet Wendy Watson and her daughter, Becky Measures, that they have a lot in common – a sense of humour and radiant smile, and a positive approach to life.

But that closeness is also mirrored in another way – they both have a defective gene that raises their chances of suffering breast cancer and both were trailblazers in undergoing radical surgery to prevent it claiming their lives.

In 1992, Wendy became the first woman in Britain to have a preemptive double mastectomy, and when Becky was only 24, she opted for the same procedure.

“I’d been aware of breast cancer from a young age,” explains Wendy, who’s detailed her experience and the challenges which led her to found the National Hereditary Breast Cancer Helpline in her book, I’m Still Standing.

“I was only nine when I watched my mother nurse my dying grandmother who suffered from it. Eight years later when I was a teenager, my mum, a teacher, died at 45, also from breast cancer.”

Despite doctors’ assurances to the contrary – in those days the medical profession was unaware of a hereditary link to breast cancer – Wendy constantly worried because of the family history that she too might develop cancer.

Her worst fears were confirmed in 1991 when she discovered that nine of the ten women in three generations of her family had been diagnosed with breast cancer. Six had died.

“I’d had years of worry. In fact, I’d been so paranoid about my breasts that I didn’t even want to check them in case I felt a lump,” she says.

“I felt by the age of 37 that I literally had a death sentence hanging over me, and feared that Becky, who was only nine at the time, would, like me, lose her mum in childhood.”

She had an enormous struggle to convince doctors that while she appeared perfectly healthy, a mastectomy was, for her, the only course of action which would give her peace of mind.

“Everyone, apart from my husband, Chris, and close family, who totally supported me, was horrified at the thought of what I was doing. As I was apparently well, they thought it was too drastic.

“But I felt surgery would allow me to live my life free from fear. An operation and losing my breasts I could cope with, but dying of a disease I could have prevented seemed ridiculous,” she says.

“When I woke up the morning after the operation I felt like the most privileged woman in the world. The elation was incredible. I had survived.”

Three years later, the test identifying faulty genes that cause cancer was developed.

Wendy and her daughter were found to carry the then newlyidentified defective BRCA1 gene.

Women with a BRCA1 gene mutation have up to an 85 per cent lifetime risk of developing breast cancer, compared with the average of 14 per cent. It is estimated that one in 200 people in the UK carry one of the high-risk genes.

“I believe that result completely vindicated my decision and preventative mastectomy is now totally accepted as a sensible risk-reducing option,” Wendy says.

Over the past 15 years she’s devoted herself to raising awareness of hereditary breast cancer.

One of Wendy’s biggest personal challenges happened in 2006, when her daughter also opted to have the same procedure, after learning that her 29-year-old cousin had developed breast cancer.

“That was a difficult time for me because even though I’d experienced it myself, seeing your daughter go through any operation is difficult,” says Wendy.

“But she faced it so courageously and it was wonderful to know that she too had removed that very real threat to her health. She plays a key role in the charity now.”

“My breasts were ticking time bombs,” says Becky, a radio presenter.

“Mum left it totally up to me to make the decision but I’d seen how positive surgery could be in our situation.

At the time, I was the youngest person to have that elective surgery.”

She nominated her inspiring mother as Tesco Mum of the Year, a title she won this year.

“I regard myself as very blessed to have been able to change my destiny,” says Becky.

Wendy, 56, who lives near Bakewell, in Derbyshire, now devotes all her time to running the 24-hour National Hereditary Breast Cancer Helpline, a charity she set up in 1996.

It allows “at-risk” women to access information on all the options available to them, as well as referrals and support.

Recently, Wendy also established 30 support groups throughout the UK, including one especially for those aged under 25 for whom there is little else on offer.

She works around the clock, running the helpline, training volunteers, seeking funding and organising fundraising events to ensure the charity continues, as currently it only receives limited financial funding from primary care trusts.

“The gene test is wonderful in that it allows women to consider what course they wish to take. But there’s many paths available to them, from screening, drug trials, having surgical intervention or, of course, doing nothing,” she says.

“There is no right or wrong thing to do – it’s a matter of individual choice.

“I’m just someone who refused to accept my genetic inheritance and I will never give up helping other women to empower themselves and decide their own futures.”

• I’m Still Standing, by Wendy Watson, is published by Simon & Schuster, priced £6.99. Available now. For more information on the Hereditary Breast Cancer Helpline, visit breastcancergenetics.co.uk or call 01629-813000.