This podcast contains the personal stories, opinions and experiences of its speakers, rather

than those of Breast Cancer Now. Welcome to the Breast Cancer Now podcast, providing support and

information to anyone affected by breast cancer. I'm Laura Price and I'm the host of the Breast

Cancer Now podcast. I'm a food writer and author and I live with secondary breast cancer. Today we

are speaking to the Paralympic champion Erin Kennedy. Erin is a crucial part of team GB's

Paralympic rowing squad and has many accolades to her name, including three-time world champion

and European champion, two-time world cup winner and world record holder, and she even has an MBE for

services to rowing. Erin is also a breast cancer campaigner, particularly focusing on the

importance of early detection. She was diagnosed in 2022 at the age of 29. Amazingly, she continued

competing during chemotherapy, winning gold at the 2022 European Championships. She went on to

win the 2023 European Championships after a double mastectomy and 15 rounds of chemo. She's

now training full-time for the 2024 Paris Games, which are taking place in August and September.

Erin, welcome to the Breast Cancer Now podcast. Thank you for having me. Firstly, I just wanted to

say, wow, I am so honored to be in the company of such an incredibly accomplished athlete and I'm in awe

of everything you've achieved both before and after your breast cancer diagnosis. So thank you

for taking out the time out of your training to be here with us. No, it's been a long time coming and

I'm really pleased to be here. So we usually start by asking people about their breast cancer

diagnosis, but I'm going to switch up today and ask about your rowing. First of all, you're a coxswain

and I hope I've pronounced that right. For those who don't follow the sport, what does the cox do?

Yeah, everyone's like, do you have a drum? That's dragon voting. I am sort of, the best way to

describe it is sort of between kind of quarterback of American football. So I'm on the field of play. I

am doing a lot of strategy, sort of seeing how the game's playing out, kind of leading the field. I

have a very close relationship with the coach. I'm a bit like a race desk engineer in F1. I'm getting

loads of data and I need to sort of convert hard data into making the boat go faster. And then I am a

little bit like a jockey because I am sort of getting a free ride in the boat, steering and

basically getting them across the line. So I'm sort of this weird combination between kind of

sort of technician, strategist, motivator and fundamentally it's kind of my job to get the best

out of people. You can row without a cox, but it's a bit like going to the gym without a personal

trainer. You'll probably work smarter, maybe a bit harder and most likely a bit better when you've

got sort of someone leading you there. That's me. Oh, wow. That is a great explanation and I've never

heard any of that before. So is it more mental than is physical? Yeah, so kind of on delivery on the

day, loads of it is, I do loads of psychology work, working with the athletes and trying to get the

best out of them, kind of create a cohesive team. But I do all the land training as well. So I train six

days a week, you know, two to three sessions a day, partly for weight management because it's a

weighted sport for me. So I've got to be under 55 kilos. But also it takes a lot, quite a big toll on my

body. It's a little bit like Formula One drivers have to be fit. And sometimes you're like, well,

you're just driving a car. But kind of the stuff that's going through my body, a lot of it's kind of

core work. I do the neck exercises, you obviously the F1 drivers do as well. And yeah, I need to kind of

be fit and healthy in order to kind of be in the boat and do my job. So yeah, I do a lot of a lot of cycling

and stuff. And I've actually recently started running. Because before my breast cancer

diagnosis, I actually had quite big boobs and running just was a no go for me. And now I'm like,

okay, let's find the silver linings here. Maybe I can run now. So yeah, I started running. And yeah, I

do a lot of weight training, which I really enjoy, actually. And I think training was a real key part

of me sort of keeping that consistency and getting through my treatment. But it also definitely

really helped me with like the recovery from a mastectomy, kind of the prehab rehab, and all

those sorts of things. So I definitely think kind of an active lifestyle accidentally ended up

helping me when I didn't know I needed it. Yeah, wow. And how did you get into rowing in the first

place? I started at uni. So I went to Oxford, but I'd gone to a state school. I'd never come across

rowing. I actually did musical theater. I was like drama kid at school. And I went to Oxford. And I was

like, I'll just give rowing ago, because everyone does. And you've seen the boat race, maybe, you

know, around Easter Sunday and looked fun. And I got down to the boat park and I was like, five foot

three. They were like, have you thought about coxing? And I loved it. I just got really into it

because I was sort of a jack of all trade master of none sort of sports person. But I love, I'm

unbelievably competitive, love all that sort of things. And I was like, here's this kind of really

niche sport where like the confidence and I think the kind of language skills and even the stuff you

do in drama, like pitch, tone, volume, all those sorts of things can be really utilised in a

sporting context. And yeah, I just I kind of fell in love with it and then got into it and rowing at uni

and then never looked back really. That's very cool because I know a lot of people sort of say, you

know, I'm not sporty, I could never do rowing. And I've never thought of rowing as not being, you

know, I've never thought of that side, that mental side of rowing, which sounds amazing actually,

and it's about communicating. And it's about it's strategy and so much other stuff. I think rowing is

like the, I mean, I think it's the ultimate team sport, because it's the ultimate leveler. Like, I

love watching rugby and I actually particularly like watching rugby when they do like the pan

across the front where they're saying the atalantum and then the camera is showing every

different sort of shape and size and so I think, you know, rugby and there are some sports where like

it's for every body type and every wall or whatever. Whereas rowing is all about doing

exactly the same thing together. And to some extent, you're as strong as your weakest athlete,

like, and so you have to bring everyone together. And it's a very technical sport. And I think it's

kind of hard to appreciate unless one day you kind of sit in a rowing boat because it needs this

perfect combo of kind of power. And then it's also kind of, you need quite a lot of resiliency. It's a

kind of power endurance sport, kind of like swimming is really. And you have to do it together.

And as soon as it starts to break down, communication wise, technically, it's a very

slow boat and the boat starts to really pay you back if you kind of get that cohesiveness. And that's

what I really love, the kind of psychology side of it. And partly why I train with the team as well as

well as kind of it's good for me is because, you know, I want to be part of the team and it's good to

show up and do it with them. Before your breast cancer diagnosis, what would you consider to be

the biggest career highlight you've had? Would have been winning the games in Tokyo. That's the

Olympic games. Yeah. Yeah. It was a bizarre, surreal experience because it was during the

pandemic. So we had been working towards Tokyo. We come into 2020. And, you know, we start the year

thinking we're going to Tokyo, you know, my parents, my husband, a book flight, it's like

everyone was going to come out and then the pandemic hit, obviously. And within quite a short

space of time, the games were postponed. And then all of a sudden, you're sort of hitting factory

reset on a year where you've been really building momentum. And that was also assuming that it would

be able to go ahead. It was an unbelievable feat to bring people from all nations together, which

obviously was such a big risk to actually deliver. And obviously, there was no crowds, there was no

spectators. We had to bubble before. So I didn't see my husband for about two and a half months in

total. And I've never really thought of the kind of sacrificial element of sport, because I actually

just think it's a choice. It's a choice I make in the same way as so many other jobs require X, Y and Z and

you spend time away. But it really, to me, I was like, it wasn't about winning to make it worth it.

But it did feel that way by the time we crossed the line. There was a lot of relief as well as joy that

we'd done it. And it was sort of all worthwhile. And how did it feel lifting that trophy? How does it

feel? Because you've lifted a lot of trophies knowing that you are the best in the world. It

doesn't grow old, to be honest. It still feels amazing. I think hearing the national anthem play

for you and your team is pretty special. Over the subsequent weeks, it sort of made me realise how

big it was, because we didn't have crowds. We didn't have that. Obviously, we knew people were

watching at home, but it didn't really feel real until I got home. And people who I've come across,

you know, once in my life, or people I went to school with and I haven't heard from them forever, were

like messaging and things like that. And I think it made you realise how much bigger you were part of

something so much bigger than yourself. And rowing is such a funny sport, really. We're just

trying to make things go fast from A to B. And in the ground scheme of things, rowing boats don't go

that fast. Like, you see, we're working so hard, and then you look at someone just cycling next to

us. It's not an efficient way to travel. And it was really mad how much kind of everyone cared about

rowing. And Great Britain are pretty good at rowing. So even the people who've never touched

the sport would usually dial in and see that the rowing is on and be like, oh, we're good at this. And

then, you know, flick it on. So it was amazing to feel like you're part of something much bigger.

And I think that really hit me actually when we went home. And I was like, wow, actually, this is this is

really cool. Yeah. So moving on to your breast cancer diagnosis. So how and when were you

diagnosed? So the games were postponed to 21. So I took some time off after the games until the

January just had a nice time when it saw my friends and family who hadn't seen for a while and

restarted the year training, intending to kind of be building towards Paris. And we went on training

camp that May. And I genuinely was fitter and healthier than I'd ever been. Training camp was

going well. We're in beautiful Italy. And I was in the shower. As you can imagine athletes, I'm

showering, you know, three to four times a day. And I was checking myself did kind of a routine sort of

check. And I noticed something that I knew I hadn't felt before and wasn't sort of normal. And I'd

actually had a lump one lump check twice before actually. And it had been been nothing. It was sort

of sat right in the middle, the previous lump and where it sat on my rib cage. It felt quite prominent

and actually under biopsy and and ultrasound. It wasn't as big as it felt. Whereas this lump was sort

of was it was kind of here on the top of my breast, not quite as close to my rib cage. So maybe I could feel

it a little bit more. And I don't know if anyone else has kind of experiences when they found a lump or

anything like that. When you notice it, it feels like it, you know, a kidney bean all of a sudden

feels like an avocado. Like you can't not see it anymore. And it feels mad that you didn't see it

before. And almost immediately, I got in touch with the team doctor and said, I need to get I need to

get this lump checked out. And I actually had a really short space of time between coming back

from training camp and going off to a World Cup. And I knew that I needed to get it checked before I went

to this World Cup, partly because it would just be living rent free in my head. And also I wasn't going

to be hanging around another couple of weeks. And thankfully I did. And I went and basically had had a

scan, had a biopsy. And to be honest, I just didn't think it was going to be anything because you

don't, you know, I was 29 really fit and healthy. And I was diagnosed about a week later. And it was

actually the day we were supposed to fly out to the World Cup, but I postponed my flight by a day. And it

was interesting, a lot of people always say, what was the moment like, you know, when you find out it

was cancer? I was pretty sure it was cancer the moment I walked into the room because I saw a nurse

in there. And I was like, oh no, you're here for my emotional support. And my poor husband hadn't

clocked her and sat down. So he's like looking at the doctor and I'm like, oh, brace yourself, Sam.

This is not very good. And so yeah, I don't remember, I don't really remember loads of the

meeting. I remember him sort of drawing, drawing on a piece of paper and stuff like that. But yeah, it

was that that bit was a bit of a blur. And that was why I was so glad Sam was with me to be honest, because I

took him very little. As an athlete, you must know your body better than most people know their

bodies. Like, did you already know that you could have breast cancer when you were in your 20s, when

you were checking regularly? I was checking partly because there's sort of family history

paternity of breast cancer in my family. And my dad's sister had had it in her 30s. But I was being

relatively proactive. I kind of knew that people had had it in a young, when they were younger. But it

was just sort of part of my routine really, and generally kind of in the shower and being kind of

generally aware. And as I said, I had quite big boobs. And I was also quite aware that it's the

bigger the boobs, the harder to find those sorts of things. So maybe you've got to be a little bit more

proactive. But I genuinely genuinely just didn't think it would be anything. But I was doing almost

like my due diligence. When you were diagnosed, obviously, a breast cancer diagnosis is

devastating for anyone. But when your body is your career, when your career is sport and you use your

body so much for that, did you worry that it would affect your career? Yeah, I genuinely thought it

might be the end of my career. And I was also like, for history, when we've got three years between a

game cycle, not four, like I don't have time for this. This is really inconvenient. And I remember

him telling me, you know, okay, it is cancer. I was like, right, okay. And then you're instantly kind

of thinking like, okay, well, maybe I don't need chemo. So great, that'd be fine. I could do that.

And then literally, you know, the next sentences, and you will be having chemo, and you're like,

okay, maybe it won't be long. Like, you know, and you're desperately trying to find like the good in

it. And I knew it was an interesting one because I think that mentally, I've been sort of preparing

for bad news, even though I do genuinely, you know, I didn't think it was going to be anything, because

I moved my flights by a day. I checked with my team and the team management and I said, is it okay if I

fly out a day late? And they said, yeah, that's that's fine. If that's what you want to do. But you

need to think about what if this is bad news, will you be happy to fly out and compete? Should you be

doing that? And and so I'd sort of had all these hypothetical conversations with myself in a way

that I don't think if I wasn't due to go to the World Cup, that I probably wouldn't have kind of mooted

these scenarios. And I sort of thought, you know what, I will want to go because this could be my last

race. It was also I'd never raced at World Cup before and I it was the only one that I hadn't won and

I really wanted to add that to the roster. And yeah, I think it ended up being a really positive thing.

And also I knew that if I was diagnosed, how I would want to respond and deal with the diagnosis and

what better way is there to kind of signpost everyone how you want to be treated by just

basically doing it and everyone's got to keep up. And that's essentially what I did. And did you go to

that World Cup? Yeah. And you won that one? Yeah. Okay. Yeah. It was yeah, it was a really weird one.

So I got diagnosed and then I called my mum and dad, my husband called his mum and dad. Then I called my

team doctor. I called my coach. And then I was like, okay, so my mum and dad came over for dinner, as did

my in-laws. And we basically told them what we knew, which at the time, obviously, was so little.

And I was like, right, I've got a pack, so you need to leave. And you know, my husband drove me to the

airport and I went to Serbia. And it was really good, I think it was the right thing to do because,

you know, I think one of the hardest times for me wasn't the diagnosis, it was waiting for

something to happen. Because I didn't feel any illness. I didn't feel unwell. I'd found a lump.

And then all of a sudden someone goes, oh, you're not well, actually. And you're like, fine. And I

think then kind of deciding to kind of be not myself and sit back and kind of wallow in that for the

weekend, whilst my teammates were out competing, because they would have had to have replaced me,

would have really annoyed me. Like I would have been twice as grumpy, I think. Oh my god, the FOMO.

Oh, we're actually, I think the best thing for me to do is compartmentalize this and put it aside.

Because nothing's going to happen over the weekend. I'm not going to know anymore. And I just

need to enjoy this. I'm quite a visual person. And in my head, those kind of subsequent weeks after my

diagnosis, I sort of saw it, this is sort of Venn diagram of I had this, my life now, and cancer life.

And I knew that as time went on, they were going to get merged and merged and merged. And eventually

the sort of dominant cancer life, the appointments, the scams, the chemo's, the

surgeries, everything was going to dominate the life that I knew. And I wanted to enjoy living in

this sphere until I knew that I had to kind of let that in. And that's sort of how I saw it. And it's

really lovely now being on the other side of it, where those, those two bubbles have separated

quite a lot now. And I dabble into my cancer life every now and then with appointments and all those

follow ups. But I'm very firmly kind of got my feet in, in the non cancer life. Yeah. I think, like a lot

of people who've never had cancer, assume that when you have cancer, you, you look ill and you see

mill and you act ill and you feel ill. But actually, I was the same as you. I was 29. And I was probably one

of the fittest I've ever been in my life. I was diagnosed on the Friday. I'm not an athlete like

you, by any means, but I was diagnosed on the Friday. And on the Wednesday, I think I did an 8k

run. And it was the fastest that I've ever run in my life. And I felt really strong and fit. And then you

have cancer. So you can have breast cancer when you feel amazing. And you know, you're really, really

super fit. So what treatment did you then have? Yeah. So I had my diagnosis. And then I did

fertility preservation as well, which I think often gets glossed over. People don't know,

especially for younger people who are going through cancer is that that's all of a sudden

something you've got to think about. And I was, had a really positive experience, to be honest with

you. All the kind of things fell into place. And it was successful. And then, you know, the day after

fertility preservation surgery to kind of remove the eggs, I went straight into chemo. So I did

near-adjuvant chemo. So chemo first, because I have triple negative breast cancer. And I had four

rounds of EC every other week. And then I did 12 weeks of paxotaxyl and carboplatin, which

basically took me from July to December. So it's five months, basically. And you kept training,

kept working throughout your chemotherapy? Yeah. How did that decision come about? Was it just

a natural? Was it a no-brainer? Yeah. I think just stopping would have been too much. Like, I always

say to, you know, my friends who are athletes who are retiring or anything like that, like, don't

change everything at once. And sort of taking my own advice. I was like, I can't just stop and

become, you know, a cancer patient. I really hate that sort of expectation of, like you said, like

when you get ill, you really fit in healthy. And then all of a sudden they're like, you're unwell.

And now you have to, I don't know, like be unwell and stuff like that. And I was like, I don't feel

unwell. Like, why should I? And so I just basically made the decision that, okay, I'm going to keep as

much normality as I can, you know, keep my feet in that sort of non-cancer life as much as possible,

knowing that eventually, like I will end up having to take a step back. So I carried them competing. I

went to the European Championships. I'd had two rounds of EC at that point. And it was every other

week. So it just happened to be in an off week, which was very convenient. And I think it was just a bit of

like bloody mindedness, a little bit of, thankfully, the way that my body responded to the

chemo was kind of positive. Like I definitely felt weird. But I wasn't being sick, which was amazing.

I'm a very sick person. So I was really worried about that. And I pretty much was like, I am all I

have capacity for is growing, sleeping. Eating. That's it. Like I didn't kind of dabble in other

things. I really kind of shut down my social life. I really was like, this is what I want to do. That was

really hard to do. I think high performance sport is like a moving train. It's pretty brutal.

Amazing highs, big lows. And I knew that this is, I said about rowing as the ultimate team sport. And

sometimes you need to know when you're slowing the team down. And I thought I can do euros. I can do

this. But like, I won't be reliable enough for them and what they need from me for the next couple of

months. And actually, I need to look after myself. I still kept training. I'm still going in with the

team, but I kind of stepped back from the international competition side just to let them

kind of process and deal with stuff. Because I think that's another thing with cancer and breast

cancer, especially everyone knows someone and it really brings people in and people are amazing.

But it is a big thing on other people, on the support networks that you have, whether that's your

partners, your parents, your teammates, your friends. And to me, it was sort of recognizing that

I didn't want their energy kind of being going to supporting me to achieve something I really

wanted to do and it compromising kind of what they were working towards as well. Yeah, you've called

it the ultimate team sport multiple times. How did you break the news to your teammates and how did

they take it and how did they support you through it? What's up? Which is, I mean, they knew I was

having an appointment, so it wasn't too big of a shock. But I broke it to my teammates because I was

basically getting on the flight the next day to go and enter a competition environment and I needed

them to, I kind of needed stuff from them and they needed stuff from me. So I knew they were waiting to

hear the results of my appointment. So I really thought about, okay, how do I, how do we both get

what we need out of this scenario? And I didn't have the emotional energy to be FaceTiming or anything

like that. I needed to kind of be processing. So I wrote them what's that message and I basically

said, look, this is what I know, unfortunately, is breast cancer. This is what I know. I know that

we're treating to cure. I will kind of need some big kind of interventions. I didn't say kind of, I knew

about chemo because I didn't want to freak everyone out. But basically, this is what I know.

And then I will be coming out and the team doctor and my coach know. And then this is what I need from you.

And then I basically was like, I don't want hugs. I don't want you to ask if I'm okay. I want to really

enjoy the next five days doing my job and doing what I love with the people I love. So thanks very much.

See you tomorrow. And it was, it was exactly what I needed. Like, everyone just respected by wishes

and it was great. And actually, I wish I could have that clarity now, being on the other side of

cancer. And I find the kind of post cancer bit harder to navigate because I don't know quite what

I want. Like, I want to go back to, and I don't use and use the word normal, but I want to go back to, you

know, a way of life that I kind of, it was familiar to me and but I don't want to pretend like it never

happened. And I wish I could write a WhatsApp message to everyone saying, this is what I want,

you know, I want acknowledgement, but I don't want pity. I want this and I want that. But I haven't

written that because I have no idea how to articulate it. But I think it was probably the best

thing I probably did around my diagnosis was just basically laying out the expectations and what I

needed from people. Because I think that's one of the hardest things when you get diagnosed is

people don't know how to respond to you. And you will have experienced it that people get it wrong

way, be more than they get it right with the best of intentions. And it's incredibly hard to

articulate to them what's not quite wrong or right or whatever. And yeah, I had a really, really good

few days at competition. And it was exactly what I needed. Because I left knowing that if it didn't

work out and I didn't do the auras that I, you know, was proud of myself and we'd gone and won the World

Cup. And if I had to retire, and that was the end of my career, I went out on a high and on my own terms. Why

did you say no hugs? Was that, do you think that was a you didn't want pity? Yeah, I didn't want pity. And

I knew I'd cry. I knew that like that, like the holding of the hug, I think as soon as I was like

enveloped in someone's arms, I would be, you know, that compartmentalization would fall down and

I'd be, yeah, I'd be struggling. So I kind of, yeah, I just needed to, I needed to do the job. It's like

when you have the worst day or the worst week ever and all these different things happen one after

the other and you're holding it up and you're holding it up and you're holding it up and then

someone says, are you okay? And you're like, no. But I fully relate to your digital approach

because I did the exact same thing. I remember, and mine was in 2012. So WhatsApp was in its infancy,

but I remember telling people via WhatsApp. And then I wrote a blog post that went out to like

everyone. I told this sort of inner circle personally, but I never want to have to break that

news over the phone because it's just you're then dealing with everyone else's feelings. And if you

can do it digitally, then at least people can deal with their feelings and then they can come back to

you with, you know, sort of, um, So, you know, you're a very rational and slightly less

emotional head-on because you, as the cancer patient, don't need or want to have to deal with

everyone else's feelings on top of your own. Yeah, totally. It's tough. Giving everyone the space to

deal with it was really key. And I think, you know, you were really young as well when you were

diagnosed and it's the people that you've got your, you're in a circle who probably knew you were

having the appointments and things like that, like mine definitely did. And then there was that

like that one that's just half a step out where, you know, you're not going to tell the world that

you're going to get a lump checked. And then it's those people and beyond who didn't know you were

going to get anything checked. So for them, it completely hits them out of nowhere. And I found

that, you know, really hard. Like I empathised with them almost. It was really bizarre. And if I'm

honest, you know, my husband kudos to him because when I went away, I had a good weekend. I don't think

he had a great weekend. He called and told a lot of people. So I didn't have to. And then I went and

competed. And then we just had a few days on our own in Paris. And I just remember we met up and we did

lovely things and ate croissants and drank wine. And I was just like, have you Googled anything? It

was like, nope. I was like, nope, no, me. Okay, good. Like this. And we just were like, we're not

Googling. We're not doing this. We're just going to like crack on. And we barely talked about kind of

me being unwell or anything like that. And it was just, it was, is what we needed. And so if anyone's

kind of listening to this and whether they know someone who's been diagnosed or they've been

diagnosed kind of themselves is like, don't be afraid to go. Do you know what? Just, I'm just not

going to talk about it today. And don't be afraid to tell people that you don't want to talk about it as

well because, you know, you just crave normality. And sometimes that's just the best thing. I want to

be able to answer the how are you question with how's my life going? Not how's my treatment going?

Yeah. You also just reminded me of what you said before about how you're in this sort of limbo place

at the moment where you're post cancer and you want to go back to your life, but you also don't want to

forget that you don't want to pretend it never happened. And it is hard to, to know what to tell

other people because you don't necessarily know what you need from them and you do want to move on and

you do want to be normal. Yeah. It's interesting because obviously I do a reason about media and

journalists are like almost like they don't say it as bluntly as this, but it's like, well, you know,

is there going to be a point where you're not talking about cancer anymore sort of thing? And

I'm a bit like, no, I don't think so, you know, because it's still a big part of me and my life. And I

think actually the best way that anyone who hasn't been impacted by cancer can think about it is like,

well, you know, we're not all still talking about the pandemic, but there are hangovers in the way

that we live our lives, which were massively impacted by the pandemic. Even if that's just

from, you know, a company that you work for was really slow digitally and now has had to like

really progress and now half your meetings are online and you have hybrid working. It doesn't

mean you're still talking about the pandemic, but the pandemic impacted your life in a big way. And I

think that's sort of how I feel about cancer. And like you say, it's sort of, I sort of see it like a

sort of, you know, like grief at one point, you've got like the ball of grief and it's hitting the

different sides of the square and it's hitting it all the time and it's so relevant. And now your life

is just sort of growing around it. It doesn't mean that the cancer bit is not there anymore, but your

life is just kind of full of other things, which is, which is quite nice. Yeah. Your sport is as much

mental as it is physical. What was your mental approach to cancer? I know you talked about sort of

just not Googling it and not was there an area of just pretending it wasn't there or I actually

think being a sports person helped me so much going through cancer. I always talk about it with rowing

is staying in your lane, like staying in your lane and focus on the race in front of you. In rowing, all

we're trying to do is go from A to B as fast as possible. You know, it's quite simple and getting

distracted about what's going on around you sometimes can be like the biggest thief of joy when

you're comparing your experiences of cancer to other people. And so I think when I was first

diagnosed, I was like, OK, well, they've got triple negative and they're having this and

should I have that? And I don't know. Oh, my goodness. And and actually just understanding

that for me, you know, the way my body was going to respond to chemo and what was right for me and

surgery options and all those sorts of things, basically stay in your lane, like focus on your

experiences, your journey for cancer. And I think that's one of a better word because on paper, you

could have two people with exactly the same diagnosis, same X, Y and Z and the outcomes can be

vastly different. And so I think that was really important. And then I think for me, then the other

thing was kind of reframing a lot of it. And I think kind of cognitive reframing is something, some

one of the best skills that anyone can have, but we do it a lot in sport. And I mean, I bluntly, it's

finding the silver lining and putting context into what's going on in your own experiences. And I

think I basically chose to never say why me. This is unfair. And I think that was a huge part of helping

me get through it, basically. I hear you on that one. Yeah. You've done a lot of press and we've

touched on this slightly, but you've done a lot of media since your breast cancer diagnosis. Why has

it been important to you to talk about your breast cancer? I think it felt weird to not be sharing it.

And I'm not going to lie. Like I didn't have the biggest profile like before, but you know, people

would know who I am in the rowing world at least and stuff like that. And it felt like I was hiding it.

And I was like, I have nothing to hide. This is not something to be ashamed of. And also I wanted to

raise awareness that it can happen to someone who when you're fit and healthy, I also wanted to talk

about it on social media because I knew I was going to end up having to take a step back. And I didn't

want anyone to think that I'd retired or someone could come and take my seat. I was like, I'm going to

come back. I kind of talked about it basically about a month after I'd won the World Cup. And it

really kind of blew up far more than expected. And I was like, wow, this is this is amazing. And it was it

was lovely. And I really felt like everyone was on side and it was it was really nice. And then I did

some press around the euros. And that's when it kind of went a bit mad. And I just thought,

actually, do you know what? I haven't really thought about this, but I just wanted to show that.

You don't change when you get a diagnosis. Like others change around you and how they respond. And

and but I think cancer is such a big weight to bear. It comes with so many preconceptions. I mean, I had

them myself going into cancer and people also don't get checked for a reason. People don't go

because they're scared that it might be cancer. And I was sat there going, well, here's someone who

potentially might end their career as a result of this diagnosis, who was really fit and healthy.

And I still feel like me. I still feel like the same person. And it did happen to me. So I'm going to

share it. And then anyone who wants to see, OK, what does it look like to get something checked? And it

is the worst possible scenario. Because, yes, there's elements when it's really scary. But

actually, there's elements where it's funny. There's elements where there is joy to be found.

You don't lose your identity. And so just as it sort of rolled on, I just sort of gathered these people

who were following me and and supporting me for all manner of reasons, whether they were interested

in rowing and my sporting side of things, or they're interested in what's it actually like to

be a young person having chemotherapy? How did you make these decisions and and all those sorts of

things? And, you know, just tried to kind of show what it's like for a real person, actually, just to

have this. And and it's just been a real privilege to be honest, to be able to use my platform. I hope to

kind of show people that, you know, you don't lose yourself when you get diagnosed. You can still do

amazing things when you have a diagnosis. And there is life after cancer as well. Yeah. You know,

it's it's rehumanising cancer because it happens and how how you respond to it and deal with it is kind

of your biggest superpower. And you also took a lot about early detection, don't you? Yeah, 100

percent. Because I just think that is the best thing that you can do. It's like the best gift you

can give yourself and checking doesn't need to be something that's difficult and you're not

looking for cancer when you're checking yourself. You are looking to know what's normal.

So then then if something that pops up that isn't normal, you have the confidence to go and get it

checked out. And just being aware of the signs and symptoms, I maybe fell into the stereotype of I

found a lump. But, you know, it could be anything from kind of inversion of nipples or kind of

dimpling that shouldn't be there, kind of puckering discharge from your nipples, anything

that's kind of yeah, unexpected. And I think one of the reasons I wanted to really talk about it is that

both kind of, you know, breast cancer, but then there's also kind of the other embarrassing

cancers maybe that fall into that category, whether that's, you know, bowel cancer, cervical

cancer, variant cancer, you know, see, or men, the prostate, testicular, all these sorts of things

like we should not be prudish about talking about these things. They're just bodies, you know, and

being comfortable talking about that in the public sphere. I think the more you talk about it,

the more you normalise it. Hopefully the more people start checking themselves and can see that

it's not a weird thing to do and it can be just part of your routine, just like brushing your teeth. When

it comes to knowing what your normal is, you it's normally a touch feel thing rather than a visual

thing, even though looking is a really important part of checking. And how often does the average

person, you know, feel anyone else's breasts, know what dense breast looks like or feels like

versus not people with smaller boobs, bigger boobs and all these sorts of things. It is really,

really individual. So encouraging people to, you know, you don't need to do it in a public change

room, doing it in a privacy room house is just it's just getting to know what normal is for you. And I

think I think it's just so important. And so I'm more than happy to kind of take the take it on for

everyone else and do the embarrassing thing and talk about boobs on national television. The

first one you do. And if one of our listeners does find one of those signs or symptoms, what should

they do? I mean, the first thing is go to your GP and unashamedly go to your GP, get in the field. And if

they brush you off, especially if you are younger, go to another one or go back again. Like do not get

pushed back because if it's something that you know, isn't normal, then you push it. You know,

don't ever accept that you're too young for X. Like we are actually increasingly seeing more young

women diagnosed with breast cancer and that might be also because we've got better awareness. So

people are catching it earlier, which is fantastic. So basically don't get turned away.

Keep pushing because it's your piece of mind. And as I said, when I found my lump, as soon as I found it,

I couldn't push it out my brain and it will live rent free with you until you get a check. Yeah, that's

very true. How has breast cancer affected your body image? I think it hasn't negatively impacted

my body image, but it has changed it. I think that I kind of in my head, I was never not going to have it

almost like to me. I have never regretted that decision. But I would say one of the challenging

things is is dressing myself, actually. I don't know, may or was a bit of a rut, but you walk into a

shop and you're like, I like this, this suits me. I shall buy it. And not being able to just walk into a

shop and pick stuff up has been like both confusing slash liberating slash irritating because I'm

now sort of left with half a wardrobe that I don't really like anymore, but weirdly don't want to get

rid of yet. And just sort of figuring all that out has been has been interesting. I found it really

frustrating trying to lift weights in the gym. I used to be able to like, bash out pull ups and things

like that every now and then I just go and hang off a bar and I'm like, nope, still feels weird. Like I

don't feel confident in my upper body to like lift weights and stuff like I used to. I'm getting

there. But, you know, the way that my reconstruction happened is I had implant

reconstruction is, you know, it fundamentally your chest has been reconstructed. That's where

the word comes from. And, you know, your pecs been moved the way that the different kind of chains are

working don't feel normal. And I've kind of found that quite frustrating. The big plus I have found

is bras are very much cheaper than they used to be. And I've tried to kind of lean in summer clothes. I

feel I'm getting there with like, oh, this is nice, a little top. And I can wear these sorts of things.

Winter clothes I'm still working on, but it's it's definitely been more of a learning cover than I

expected, actually. I have not had a mistake to me at all. But I had my sternum bone, my entire sternum

bone removed last year and replaced with a synthetic one and had the latissimus dorsi taken

off my back and put onto my chest to help my body accept it. So my chest now looks different. Like my

bone, my clavicle kind of sticks out and there's less flesh on my chest. And it's all very weird. And

I've that's just over a year ago. And I have felt those changes, that weirdness, how things feel

differently. I had to get back to swimming and just not being able to swim at all initially. And then

slowly getting into doing front crawl, get into the point where I can do front crawl as well as I

could do before I had the operation and stuff. And it is all possible, but it does all feel weird. And I

can't imagine when that sport is your job, how different that must be as well. But have you like,

how has keeping up the training and the competing throughout your diagnosis and your treatment

been in terms of helping you and helping you get better? I think it was it was huge. Like I think one

of the hardest things potentially in that initial bit was when you have a diagnosis until you maybe

start the treatment is that kind of I'm lost. I don't know where I'm going. What does my future

look like? Because I spend so much time knowing, I mean, if you said, Aaron, what are you doing on the

7th of June? I could literally be like, I'll be here, maybe in the country, maybe not. I'll

probably have these sessions. This isn't this. And all of a sudden not having that structure was

really hard. So kind of having the structure was fantastic because it kind of gave me goals. And

then when that was taken away, I really struggled with that, which was one of the reasons I was like,

I'm going to keep going into training and I'm going to keep competing and knowing what I was working

towards. But the mental challenge, I think the biggest one for me was finishing chemo and then

waiting for my double mastectomy. So I finished chemo 8th of December and I was having the double

mastectomy 26th of Jan. Because the double mastectomy was a huge milestone, which was full of

uncontrollables. There's no regular chemo. There's no end date. You're going to be better now.

You can go back to rowing. And there's a lot of risk in a double mastectomy and having a double

reconstruction as well. The surgery was eight hours. How are you going to come out of it? Will it

have gone well? I was also waiting to see if my lymph nodes had been impacted or not, thankfully they

hadn't. But am I going to have them all removed? There's a one in ten get a kind of an infection. If

you do get an infection, you might have to lose the implants. There's all these sorts of things. And

it was that uncontrollable that I actually really struggled with more than the chemo itself.

Because I was like, I don't know how this is going to play out. This is where the sports person of me came

in again and I spoke to my surgeon and I was like, I'd like to prehab. What can I do? And she was like,

well, there's no official NHS prehab, but I guess. I mean, I'm going to be working in and around your

pecs and your shoulders. And so what can you do to make my job easier? And so for anyone who is

potentially undergoing a single or double mastectomy, if you want to sort of get your body as

well as you can, is basically stretching out your pecs as much as you can. So it's kind of all kind of

pushing the shoulders back, sort of working on your lats, working on your abs because you'll need

your abs to help you get up and around because you won't be able to pull yourself up onto things.

That's more kind of on the other side of things. But then, yeah, as much as you can stretch out your

pecs, and it's as simple as like, you know, hand against the wall and pushing and stretching out

that area because the looser your pecs are, the easier it's going to be to kind of get in there and

reconstruct and hopefully, you know, make it easier on the other side. I think that's also me

just trying to control the controls. You know, how can I help myself the most? And so I just was like,

I'm going to be the best patient ever. And I think even whether it helped or didn't help, I'm never

going to know. But mentally, it made me feel better. And so, and yeah, I did like my rehab every

day just to try and death really get back to competition. That's a great tip. And how are you

getting on with your trading for the summer 2024 Paralympics? Yeah, going really well, really

well. So, yeah, I got back into the boat in May 23. And it was mad because I basically went and

competed at the European Championships in Lake Bled in Slovenia. I'd never raced there. Oh, my

gosh, it's amazing. And they only have rowing regattas there kind of every kind of eight to 10

years. And so I know that I'll probably never race there again in my career. So like, what a place to

kind of come back. And it was a year to the day I was diagnosed that the competition started, which if

you wrote that in a book, that would sound far-fetched. And, you know, I just imagined being

there. And then I was there and it was just it was amazing. And so that was kind of a really, really

big milestone in like, I'm back. This is good. So since then we raced that summer and qualified for

the games. And we've been in a really heavy winter block recently, which has been quite a big toll on

my body. I then had kind of a second part of my reconstruction in October. So that sort of early

season, October to December, was sort of coming back from that second part of my reconstruction

because I had expanded implants, swapped form or permanent implants. But, you know, I'm looking at

2024 with no surgeries, no chemo. And yeah, just getting ready for the summer, which is really

exciting. The Olympics has always been so intertwined with my cancer life. And there's been

so many things that you've mentioned in this interview about the that made me think there's so

many parallels between sports and cancer because you talked about your 15 cycles and reaching the

end of those. And it's like the final straight. And I remember thinking of I remember coming to the end

of my chemo and thinking of cancer as like a marathon and you're reaching the finish line and

you're, you know, you've got all these different hurdles to overcome. Yeah, there's so many sports

and allergies. But when I had my chemo, it was during the Olympics of 2012. And I can't remember

if my I think it was my first session. It was the Brownlee Brothers Triathlon, right? Yeah. And

I'm from Yorkshire and they're from Yorkshire. Yorkshire smashed it in the 2012 Olympics. And I

remember sitting in the chemotherapy unit at the Christie in Manchester and watching the Brownlee

Brothers cross the finish line as the final drips of the chemo went into my veins and my mum and dad

were both there. And I still whenever I think whenever I see the Brownlee Brothers on TV, it

brings tears to my eyes, especially that time when a few years later, I think in Mexico or someone, one

of them carried the other one over the finish line. And yeah, it's just, I don't know, sport is just a

great analogy with breast cancer. Yeah, I think it is. And I think like it's that you're nearly done.

And then and then when you and then when you finish, and I think I think there's also that kind of life

after cancer thing, I can see it in athletes as well, because there's that bit where like you sort

of, you know, ideally win the medal and you know, and you have that. And then you're like, oh, whoa,

like that was a lot. And you're then like dealing with like the aftermath, which has like massive

highs. But also, you know, like a lot of people who then generally at games, people tend to kind of

retire afterwards or whatever. And then they're like, no, what, you know, this has been my it's such

an identity thing as well. And this is and how do I move on from that and and everything? Yeah,

definitely. There's so many overlaps. Yeah, I think it can all take a long time to process as well.

Yeah, definitely. You need time for that. So there's a lovely quote on your website that I'd

like to read out, which is, I didn't want breast cancer to define me, but ironically, it has more

than anything else in my life. The difference is I have written the narrative. What does it mean to

you to write the narrative? And is that something we can do with any adversity in life? Yeah, 100

percent. I think that being the main character of your own story is the most important thing. And it

was for me. It was one of the reasons that I decided to use my platform and speak out about breast

cancer is one of the reasons that I'm still talking about it now. And I hope I never stopped talking

about it, to be honest, because I think that I just didn't want to be typecast as this or that or the

other. And I think it's the worst way to meet some amazing people. And I think that there are so many

people who have so many stories and are doing such amazing work that it would be such a shame not to be

able to kind of like, you know, share what they do and share the importance of, you know, what it's

like to be someone with cancer and how then you can help others kind of support those people or

whether you have breast cancer yourself. It's it's there's no one way to do things. And I think

that, you know, I've said it before, but like, I think cancer is such a can be such a burden to the

person that has it in a way that other big diseases maybe don't have that kind of rep and come with

these these kind of expectations or preconceptions or anything like that. And I think

for me kind of writing the narrative, well, this is how I want to do it. I was really interesting when I

was diagnosed. I my team doctor has been amazing. She's actually Steve Redgrave's wife, Anne, and

she's been kind of my link with rowing and the my oncology team and really kind of supporting me

through it. And she's been a team doctor for, I don't want to say the wrong number here, but over 20

years. And she sees all these athletes come through the GB rowing team. We're a big team. It's

kind of at any time 70 athletes sort of in the training centre. She's like, we've never had

anyone with cancer before. An athlete having cancer whilst competing. But she was like, but we

will again at some point. And actually there's always a first. And for me, I was the first in

rowing, but I won't be the last. And so if I can go, OK, this is how I'm going to do it. Then that sort of

paves the way I hope for the next for the next people. I think like a rising tide lifts all the

boats. And so, you know, if you can use your platform and keep talking about, I think that's

that's definitely for me. And that's that kind of writing the narrative was a really big part of me

and my mental state and getting through it. OK. I'd like to end with the question we ask everyone on

this podcast, which is if you could change one thing in terms of breast cancer diagnosis,

treatment and beyond, what would it be? Well, that's a big question. I think it would be to kind of

empower patients to have the confidence to advocate for themselves to be able to ask

questions without time limits, to explore the options that are best for them with health care

professionals that aren't stretched and have the capacity to listen to them and hopefully act on on

on what they want. And that goes all the way through from early diagnosis through to choice over

surgery and things like that. And I think that. Yeah, kind of encouraging individuals that, you

know, you can advocate for your own health and knowing that that could be kind of received well as

well. So if someone is listening to this podcast and they have friends, perhaps who don't check

themselves or do check themselves and have found something, what would you say to them? So, yeah, I

think that everyone should be checking regardless of kind of age, size of breasts. And I

think it should just be something that just becomes part of their routine. And sort of if

you're listening to this and you know that people aren't checking, it's directing them to kind of

the right resources to help them to understand what the signs and symptoms are and to encourage

them if they do find anything that's not normal, just to go to the GP. Because early detection

really, really can sort of save lives. And so the more we talk about it, the more we encourage it, the

better it is. You're not looking for cancer. You're looking to know what's normal and you know

what isn't normal and you can go and get it checked. We'll put a link in the show notes to the breast

cancer now website with the signs and symptoms. We also have a podcast episode with Dr. Liz

O'Reardon, where she talks about some of the terminology that you've used on this podcast,

which is talking about triple negative and what that is. And also talking about the grades and

stages, which can be very confusing terminology. So she explains all that in one of our episodes.

Erin, where can people find you or follow you if they'd like to get to know you better? If yeah, I'd

love for people to follow me. I talk about all sorts of things from breast cancer through to rowing and

everything in between, but baking, if you like that as well. So I'm mostly active on Instagram. So

you can find me by searching Erin Kennedy or I think my handle is erinmwj because my maiden name or I am

on X as Erin Vosotsky. But yeah, I'd love you to follow me. And I'm also really open to kind of DMs

and asking questions because I spoke to quite a few people when I was first diagnosed through the

wonderful community on Instagram. So if there are any one kind of wants to ask some questions that

maybe I haven't answered, there's literally nothing off the limits to me. Because the more I

think we talk about it, the more normal it becomes. So yeah, drop me a message. That is very generous of

you. Thank you so much for coming on the podcast and thank you so much for taking time out of your

training to be with us here today. Thank you, Erin. Thank you. If you enjoyed this episode of the

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