Brenda, 79, had a special bond with her dog Cleo. But little did she know, one day her hound would become her hero
Clipping the lead onto my little Yorkshire Terrier Cleo, she jumped up excitedly and yapped. “That’s right,” I said. “We’re off to the park! Your favourite outing!” Cleo whizzed around in circles and soon the lead was wrapped around us both. “Cleo,” I giggled.
“You’re tying us both up. We won’t get anywhere at this rate.”
I liked to joke that Cleo and I kept each other young. All my three children were grown up and had families of their own, and I had retired from my job as a Home Help Carer in Derby. Life was good for me and my husband, Mick, 80, and we loved spending time with our grandkids and pottering about the house and garden. But if I was planning to take things easy in my retirement, Cleo had other ideas, keeping me on my toes.
One day in April 2019, I planned to take Cleo for a walk and, despite being the grand old age of ten, she raced around the hallway in excitement, as soon as I took my coat from the hook. She was as light as a feather and loved being cuddled and carried, but when I picked her up, she arched her back and tried to push me away, pawing at me, struggling to get free. Barking like mad, she kept scrabbling at my chest .“Is there something wrong?” I asked but she just kept yapping and pushing at my chest.
I put her down, but instead of running off, she just sat there, whining and staring at me. I took off my coat, and decided we’d go to the park later. But Cleo’s strange behaviour played on my mind. It was the first time she’d refused a walk and a cuddle.
I went upstairs to my bedroom and opened my blouse to see if she had accidentally scratched me. I couldn’t see anything untoward, but something inside me told me to check further. It was then, as I gently prodded around my right breast, where Cleo had pawed me, that I felt a small lump. While it was painless, it was hard and felt like a frozen pea just under my skin.
A cold shudder went through me. I was 75 years old and screening for me was every two years. I’d had a mammogram the previous year, so I wasn’t due another for 12 months or so. Ever since I was a girl, I’d had a fear of cancer and, as I stared at myself in the mirror, I had a terrible feeling. In my heart, I knew what the lump was.
The next day, I visited my sister-in-law, June and showed her.
“I think you should get that checked as soon as the possible, Bren,” she said. It was Good Friday 2019 and we were planning to see my daughter Hayley, now 50, and take Easter eggs for her children. Telling myself that I would make an appointment at my GP when the holidays were over, I put it to the back of my mind and tried not
