Nick Payne tragically lost his wife, Dawn, to cancer. Now he is determined to help others like she did…
Falling in love on prom night, Nick and Dawn Payne were childhood sweethearts. They went on to get married and became parents to two boys.
Always on hand to help members of her local community, Dawn was loved by everyone. But devastatingly, in 2017, Dawn was diagnosed with triple negative breast cancer but the harsh side effects of her treatment did not stop her longing to help others and she started fundraising for Breast Cancer Now.
Heartbreakingly, Dawn passed away in 2019 – but Nick has made it his mission to fulfil his late wife’s legacy and has pledged to raise at least £10,000 every year for Breast Cancer Now for the rest of his life. Nick says, “Dawn was the world to our boys and I know she’d be proud of the work we have done to help a charity so close to our hearts.”
INSEPARABLE
Nick, 48, who lives in Hemel Hempstead, met Dawn at school, and they became good friends. He says, “She was funny, clever and kind to everyone. We went to prom together as mates, but when Dawn kissed me that night, I realised that I was falling in love with her. We became inseparable and got engaged after just a month.
“At just 18 we knew we wanted to spend the rest of our lives together. In July 1998, we got married in our local church and over the next seven years, we had our two boys, Charlie and Teddy. Dawn was a fantastic mum and was always helping out in the local community. Everyone loved her.”
In 2012, Dawn took voluntary redundancy before setting up her own nail salon business from home. But one evening, in April 2017, Nick returned from his retail site manager job to find her looking serious. He recalls, “Dawn said, ‘I found a lump in my breast this morning.’ She’d already been to the doctor, who’d referred her to the breast clinic. Hugging my wife, I tried not to worry.”
At the breast clinic, Dawn had a scan and biopsy. The lump in her left breast measured
