Our perfect PRESENT

Two women share their tales of their greatest gifts for Christmas

- GILLIAN HARVEY

‘The worst Christmas ended up the best’

Emma Davies, 42, is a lawyer and lives with her husband Darren, 41, and their children Toby, eight, and Chloe, four, in Exeter.

Christmas has always been my favourite time of year. As a child, I dressed up as an elf with my younger brother and put on Christmas concerts. Then, when my children, Toby and Chloe, were born, I was determined to make their festive season sparkle.

I’ve always been a positive person, so when I discovered a lump under my right breast in June 2019, I wasn’t worried. I felt healthy and had recently lost 3st. ‘I’m in the best shape of my life,’ I told my husband Darren, then 38.

But when a mammogram and biopsy revealed I had breast cancer at 40, fear hit me. ‘What about the children?’ I panicked, plus there were still things on my ‘40 before 40’ bucket list I’d not got to.

The breast cancer was fast-growing so I needed chemotherapy to shrink the golf-ball-sized tumour. Darren and I told the kids that Mummy was sick and needed special medicine for a while. Three weeks later I was hooked up to a drip in the chemo ward for the first of 16 sessions, with Darren by my side.

On the day itself I felt fine– it was two days later when the sickness overwhelmed me.

I was inundated with offers of help from family and friends, which gave me an idea. ‘You could be my “chemo-sitters”,’ I suggested, one for each round, while Darren worked or looked after the children.