Seeing what Anne and Linda are going through has made me think a lot about a mastectomy.. am I walking round with two timebombs here?
– COLEEN NOLAN ON ANGUISH OVER SISTERS’ DIAGNOSES
Such a seismic feeling of shock hit Coleen Nolan when she heard about her two sisters’ cancer diagnoses that there were no tears. That was swiftly followed by fury.
This week her “brave and brilliant” older sisters Anne and Linda revealed they both have cancer and are undergoing gruelling chemotherapy treatment.
It’s yet another cruel blow for the close-knit Nolans, who lost sister Bernie to breast cancer in 2013, at just 52.
Anne and Linda received the devastating diagnoses within days of each other during the height of the lockdown in the spring.
Anne, 69, was diagnosed with stage-three breast cancer after beating the disease in 2000.
Linda, 61, has secondary cancer that first metastasised to her hip and pelvis in 2017 and then recently to her liver, after she battled breast cancer in 2006.
Coleen, 55, says: “I was still in bits after hearing that Anne had cancer when Linda called a few days later to tell me about her diagnosis and I was so shocked I couldn’t even cry.
I just felt incredible anger – ‘Cancer can f **** off ’ is what I thought.
“It was heartbreaking and felt so unfair, and I wanted to jump in my car immediately and drive to Blackpool to give them both a hug, but I couldn’t because we were in full lockdown and they were shielding. I felt totally helpless.”
Coleen, who still hasn’t been able to see her sisters because of the restrictions, says she’s taken strength from their positivity and they are in touch daily via WhatsApp.
“I’m completely in awe of their courage,” she says. “It’s been hard for both of them not being able to see family, and it’s especially hard for Anne who misses her daughters Amy and Alex, and her grandkids.
“A few days after chemo they feel very sick and my other sisters Maureen and Denise, who are looking after them, keep the family updated when they’re too ill to get in touch.
“But as soon as they feel better, they’re back on WhatsApp and out of bed living their lives.
“Their determination reminds me of Bernie, who didn’t give in until she took her last breath and I’ve questioned many times over the past weeks whether I’d be that brave.”
She admits that seeing photos of Anne and Linda this week, bravely exposing their shaved heads, hit her hard.
Coleen says: “I hadn’t seen Anne and Linda completely bald and it did bring back memories of Bernie. I’m doing my best not to dwell on those thoughts – I feel I have no right to do that when Anne and Linda are coping so well. But it upset me when I read Anne saying she doesn’t want to die.
“As the eldest sister, Anne has always been very strong and to hear her sound so vulnerable broke my heart.”
Coleen admits her sisters’ latest cancer battle has made her think about similar life-threatening risks to her own health.
“The guilt is incredible,” she explains. “I don’t feel guilty for not having the disease; I feel guilty for being afraid of it when I think of Anne and Linda living with it. But of course it’s hard not to be consumed by fear when those so close to you have been affected.”
Neither Linda nor Anne carries the mutated BRCA 1 and 2 genes that raise a woman’s risk of developing breast cancer in her lifetime from 12 per cent to 90 per cent.
But a geneticist has told the family that it’s unlikely to be down to bad luck that three sisters have been diagnosed.
Coleen says: “The cancer that’s affected my sisters could be down to a rogue gene from my dad’s side of the family.” So has Coleen considered having an elective double mastectomy to reduce her risk of developing breast cancer in the future?
“Of course. Seeing what Anne and Linda are going through has made me think a lot about having a mastectomy,” she reveals. “I’ve been lying in bed at night, looking down at my breasts and thinking, ‘Am I just walking around with two timebombs?’ If that’s a possibility, maybe I need to get rid of them.”
Coleen, who’s mum to Shane Jnr, 31, and Jake, 27, from her marriage to actor Shane Richie, and Ciara, 19, from her marriage to second husband, musician Ray Fensome, says her children are also worried.
“My kids definitely think I should investigate surgery” she says. “They’re absolutely terrified because they’ve seen cancer ravage our family.”
After a breast cancer scare in 2009 when she was competing in Dancing On Ice, Coleen now sees a specialist every year to check her breasts for abnormalities.
“I found a big lump when I was in the bath one night,” she recalls. “My ex-husband Ray booked an appointment the next day and it was really scary. When a specialist eventually told me it was an infected gland, the relief was immense.”
Coleen checks her breasts in the shower daily and looks at them in the mirror to check for changes.
She encourages her daughter Ciara to do the same, explaining: “We’re all worried about our kids – Anne’s girls Amy, 39, and Alex, 32, have a mum and two aunties who’ve developed the disease, so we are always saying, ‘Please check yourself !’.” The last time Coleen saw Anne and Linda was when they filmed their Quest Red reality travel series, The Nolans Go Cruising, in February.
“I’ve been watching the show every Tuesday night and reliving those wonderful times we had,” she says. “It felt like touring in the Nolan Sisters back in the 1970s when we had no kids and no responsibilities.”
Coleen says she’s immensely proud of how her family have pulled together during these difficult times.
“And we can still see the humour in things,” she says. “I was devastated for Linda when she lost her blonde hair, but when she came to terms with it, I sent a message round, saying: ‘If nothing else, you can make loads of money as a Right Said Fred tribute act!’.
“We all fell about laughing. That’s how the Nolans get through things. The sadness is always there, but it’s our way of coping with a terrible situation.”
My kids are absolutely terrified because they’ve seen cancer ravage our family
COLEEN ON HER CHILDREN SHANE JR, JAKE AND CIARA