The one lesson I’ve learned from life

WeLsh MeZZO-sOPranO Katherine Jenkins OBe, 35, is a classical-crossover singer. she divides her time between London and new York, where she lives with her husband, film director andrew Levitas, and their six-month-old daughter, aaliyah reign.

Live every day as if it was your last

My DaD was from a different era; he smoked his entire adult life. When he was diagnosed with lung cancer we were told he had more than six months to live, but he left us very quickly, within two months.

He was 70; I was just 15. The idea that you just never know what’s around the corner has been with me since then.

My friend Polly and I met when I was 20 and moved to London. I was a singing teacher and gave her girl band vocal coaching. The connection was instant and we soon formed a close-knit circle of girlfriends.

We were all shocked when she was diagnosed with cervical cancer aged just 24. She had moved house and missed the letter for her smear test; she wasn’t even feeling unwell when she found out. What followed was a gruelling round of radiotherapy, which was successful.

She was well for five years, then suffered a bout of pneumonia over Christmas. During her time in hospital, doctors discovered two small tumours in her lymph nodes.

She believed the radiotherapy had exhausted her body, so decided to fight the new cancer in a natural way.

She adopted a ‘clean’, raw food diet and a completely different way of life, including taking up positive thinking, yoga and meditation. She was trying to heal herself from the inside out.

But Polly’s cancer was incredibly aggressive and she died in June 2014, when she was 32.

I never imagined one of my girlfriends would be taken away so young.

What Dad and Polly’s stories have taught me is always to be mindful of the things you’re putting in your body. Eat foods that nurture and heal you, not ones that damage you. For example, I’m now a vegetarian, I limit alcohol and I’d never put chemicals in my body.

I believe there’s always a positive somewhere. Tragic though it was, Dad and Polly’s experience has impacted my life and made it better. That was their gift to me.

They taught me that close relationships never leave you, even in death — and looking after your health is the very best thing you can do for yourself.