The Scotsman

Tributes to newsreader and blogger after death from cancer

- By ANDREW ARTHUR

0 Rachael Bland documented her cancer experience online Newspresen­terrachael­bland has died after being diagnosed with incurable cancer.

The news comes days after the 40-year-old BBC Radio 5 Live newsreader revealed on social media that she had only days to live.

Her family confirmed that she had died yesterday shortly after 3am, the BBC said.

A post on Bland’s official Twitter account said: “Our beautiful, courageous Rachael died peacefully this morning surrounded by her close family. We are crushed but she would want me to thank everyone who took an interest in her story or sent messages of support. You’ll never know how much they meant to her. Steve and Freddie xxx.”

Bland was diagnosed with primary triple-negative breast cancer in November 2016 and had been documentin­g her journey on her blog Big C Little Me, which has the tag line “Putting the can in cancer”.

Her podcast, You, Me and the Big C, reached number one in the UK podcast charts after Bland made her announceme­nt earlier this week.

The 40-year-old was married to husband Steve for four years. The couple had a two-year-old son Freddie and would have celebrated their fifth wedding anniversar­y on 14 September.

In a tweet posted on Monday, the broadcaste­r wrote: “I’m told I’ve only got days. It’s very surreal.”

In an early episode of her podcast she told how she had discovered she had cancer after breastfeed­ing Freddie.

She said: “I had pain first. I had this weird soreness. It was kind of inside my armpit. It went away. It was just around the time I was breastfeed­ing.

“But because of that I was having a little bit of a feel. When I found it, I was like: ‘How did I miss this?’

“It was the size of a walnut.” Her husband Steve told the BBC: “Rachael’s death has left a huge hole in our perfect little family that we’ll never be able to fill.”

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