Amy Dowden has revealed that losing her hair was the most emotional part of her cancer battle. The ' Strictly Come Dancing star underwent a mastectomy and chemotherapy after being diagnosed with breast cancer in 2023 , and also battled life-threatening sepsis during her treatment. However, she confessed that nothing made her as emotional as shaving off her hair due to the side-effects of her treatment.
In an extract from her book Dancing in the Rain, published by the Mail on Sunday, she wrote: "My life away from Strictly was distinctly unglamorous. "With each new chemo session, the next challenge was growing more and more obvious. Before I could say goodbye to cancer, I would have to say goodbye to my hair.
And I think I cried more over that than anything else.I would have to trim it, clip it and finally shave it completely and then face the terrifying decision to appear on national TV with a fuzzy bald head." Due to her treatment, Amy and her husband Ben Jones had to undergo fertility treatment so she could have her eggs retrieved before starting chemo.
She felt "really lucky" because of how successful the process was. She added: "At times I was an emotional mess and broke down in floods of tears. Going through surgery, facing chemo and now putting a lot of hormones into my body, my life had changed so radically in such a short space of time.
There were no guarantees, our consultant warned but at last there was good news." "I responded well, and ten days later, a medical tea.