Waiting for surgery was hard, fearing my cancer had spread, I was crying a lot randomly. but it is in the lab now and I feel like I've done something

Her face is beautifully made up, her hair immaculately straightened and her smiley cheekbones as perky as ever

- EMILY RETTER

At first glance, there is little to separate Amy Dowden who sits in her living room in fluffy slippers from the star dancer who lights up the Strictly Come Dancing ballroom, except a slim, protective cushion under her right arm.

This, and the fact the 32-year-old is at the moment unable to move that limb, are the only outward signs of the single mastectomy she had six days beforehand, and the grade three, aggressive breast cancer she was diagnosed with four weeks ago.

Giving her first newspaper interview since that frightening diagnosis, and speaking for the first time since surgery, she admits hesitantly: "This is the first day I have felt like Amy.

When we meet on Tuesday, her voice is sometimes so quiet as she speaks of the devastating blows she is weathering, it is hard to catch.

She admits a close friend has helped her get ready because the surgery has rendered her, for now, unable even to turn the handle of her shower.

She returned home from hospital last Friday. Surgeons removed two tumours and three further cancer "specks", plus some lymph nodes, from her right breast, which have now been sent for analysis.

"The cancer is in the lab now, which is the most important thing," she says, resolutely. "The hardest time was waiting for surgery, thinking 'I have cancer inside me"."

She adds: "You're thinking 'It's grade three, what if it's spreading, what if it spreads tonight?'.

The feeling of it made me feel disgusted, disgusting.

"That's the time I was randomly crying, emotional. But we drove away and I thought, 'It's gone'.

"I'm a doer, I feel we have done something." That sense of control helps but she must now wait until next week for her histology report to tell her what stage her cancer is at, and if it has spread.

Only then will she know what treatment is needed.