Sarah Harding’s cancer reminds ‘dumbstruck’ Gloria Hunniford of daughter Caron

Hearing that Girls Aloud star Sarah Harding had been diagnosed with breast cancer was a shock.

At 38, she seemed too young, too vibrant, too full of life to be facing such a terrible disease.

But for TV presenter Gloria Hunniford, 80, it was all too familiar and the news took her right back to 1997 when her daughter Caron Keating was diagnosed with breast cancer.

“I was dumbstruck,” says Gloria. “Caron was 34. And like Sarah, she was young, fit and fastidious about her diet.

“At the time, I knew of no other young girls with breast cancer. I was devastated when my gorgeous mum had to have a mastectomy in her 70s, but you half expect health problems in your parents. Not in your young daughter.”

Just 4% of the 55,000 women diagnosed with breast cancer in the UK each year are under 40.

Breakthroughs

In a moving Twitter post, Sarah told her fans that she was having weekly chemotherapy sessions.

She also vowed to fight the disease with every fibre of her being, saying: “I am doing my very best to keep positive. I am fighting as hard as I can.”

And Gloria believes that same unfailingly upbeat attitude helped Caron and her family cope with her diagnosis.

She says: “Caron never talked about losing her battle – she only ever talked about life. Her whole attitude to cancer was positivity. We all tapped in to that, and she became the teacher.

“Throughout her treatment, there were times we felt there was nothing wrong at all because there was always something fun going on: music evenings, people visiting to sing…”

Caron lost her cancer battle in 2004 but since then, there have been many breakthroughs in treatment, with more research being done all the time to bring hope for those facing the disease now, like Sarah.

Through her work with the Caron Keating Foundation, Gloria knows women now have more treatment options than were available to her daughter.

She says: “Treatments are improving all the time, alongside state-of-the-art technology. I recall going to a dinner, hosted by Cancer Research UK.

“The top medical man was the main speaker and had just returned from Florida with exciting and encouraging information about the drug herceptin, which subsequently has helped so many women dealing with breast cancer.

“Afterwards, he said to me, ‘While I was delivering the speech I was thinking the drug has come four years too late for Caron’.” Since that event, herceptin has saved many lives and research continues to look into targeted drug treatments and antibody immunotherapy.

Whatever treatment she chooses, Sarah – who told her Twitter followers that the cancer had spread to other parts of her body – is likely to have a long road ahead of her.

And her family will be paramount, as she acknowledged by thanking her mother in her announcement online. Gloria says her exceptionally close bond with Caron was a comfort to them both and told how she empathises with Sarah’s mother Marie, 80.

She says: “I was glad to hear that Sarah’s mum is helping her through this very difficult time. It’s very hard for close family to know the best way to give support and know what to say.

“I celebrated the end of Caron’s chemotherapy by organising a surprise trip to Paris. I turned up at her home at 6.30am with a car waiting outside to take us to the Eurostar.

“We had the most blissful day. We shopped and talked as we always did.”

After her diagnosis, TV presenter Caron relocated to Australia with her husband Russ and sons Charlie and Gabriel as she was attracted by the sunshine and complementary therapies offered there.

Gloria travelled Down Under nine times during the two-and-a-half years Caron lived there and there were precious, reflective times when the pair relived happy memories. She recalls: “One of Caron’s favourite memories was when we were living in County Down. When her dad was at golf, we would buy a big chocolate roulade and sit watching black and white films beside the fire.

“When your life goes under the microscope, it’s interesting the things you remember – little comforting things, always about family and home.

“As Caron wrote in her notebook, when you’re fighting cancer, you realise that family and close friends are everything. So Sarah, we are all with you and wishing you strength
and positivity.”

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