Of course we miss her, but even 40 years of Deborah were wonderful

As the late Bowelbabe's charity fund teams up with Omaze for its Million Pound House Draw to raise money for cancer research, Heather James recalls her inspirational daughter two years on

- Kat Hopps

AS HEATHER James watched her son Benjamin marry his long-term girlfriend Ashley in a light-filled Barbados chapel earlier this month, she felt both the presence and absence of her late daughter, Dame Deborah James. Spirited, fun-loving, brilliant Deborah, known as Bowelbabe, died aged 40, in June 2022, five years after being diagnosed with bowel cancer.

The campaigning mother-of-two and deputy headteacher did all she could to educate others about bowel cancer through her podcasting, writing and television appearances, raising £7million for research when she died.

And her impact was enormous. The family incorporated Deborah into elements of the wedding. Shortly before her death, she had a pinkish white rose - her favourite flower named in her honour for the Chelsea Flower Show. Today, £2.50 from the sale of each rose goes to the Bowelbabe Fund she started.

Heather dried six rosebuds from the original bouquet produced for her daughter, which Ben had made into buttonholes for the day. "He walked up the aisle with her, which was very emotional," says Heather, 66. Playing their special part were Deborah's son, Hugo, 16, an usher and reader, and her daughter Eloise, 14, a bridesmaid.

"Eloise gave everyone a handful of Deborah's dried petals that could be thrown outside the church as confetti," says Heather.

"I thought, 'Fly high Deborah, you're here with us"." Heather is speaking over Zoom from the lounge of the Surrey home she shares with husband Alistair, 68, and where Deborah spent her final weeks with her children, her own husband, Sebastian, and her younger siblings, Ben and Sarah.

Today, alone and interrupted only by occasional barks from Winston, Deborah's beloved dog, she thinks back to the day Prince William visited Deborah six weeks before her death to bestow her with a damehood for her campaigning.