Heather's story

Heather had been coming to my classes for some time. A quiet woman in her mid forties with a habit of putting herself down, she stayed at the back of class and quietly got on with it. She wasn't a natural dancer - her emotional reticence showed in her movements, and she didn't have the easy grace and body awareness that makes dancing seem effortless for some.

But I found myself starting to notice Heather after a while. Her dogged persistence started to yield results: her movements became more accurate, and her natural reticence started to translate into a careful softness that drew you in and made you want to watch her.

We had a hafla coming up. A hafla is a bellydance party that typically includes performances and I wanted four students to do very short solos within a group number. I chose three obvious candidates and one who hadn't expected it. Heather.

I had thought it might be a special moment for her, but I had no idea how moving it would be for me. But as I watched her go slightly pink and then a bit weepy, I started to get an insight into how dance can have a profound effect on people's perceptions of themselves. Heather had never imagined that she was the kind of person who could dance, let alone perform. And a solo? That was beyond her imaginings. It was the sort of stuff that other people did, not her.

I went home with a full heart. Feeling very satisfied with life and how much good there is in the world.

Next week, we started to work on the dance. Heather and the others stayed late to learn their solos but I noticed that Heather kept holding her side as if she had a pain below her ribs. She carried on dancing though and I don't think the matter was discussed.

She was even quieter than usual the following week. And in the break I noticed a group of friends around her. I went over and sat down and then she told me. She'd gone to her doctor about the pain in her side and hospital scans had disclosed cancer. Bad cancer. The sort of cancer they couldn't cure.

She'd demanded to know how long she had left. They said maybe four months, maximum eighteen. She cried out that she had teenage children. She'd never see them grow up, never see them married, never see her grandchildren.

The hafla was just three months away. Heather might not see that hafla. Might never get her chance to perform. The speed with which the terror of death had hit her, suddenly hit us. And brought home the horror of what she was facing.

We all hugged her and cried and hugged some more. And she looked at me and said: 'I'm going to do that dance, whatever happens. I won't have any hair, and I may not be any good but I'm going to dance even if it's in a wheelchair.'

The resolve with which Heather said it sparked a symmetrical resolve in me. I'd make damn sure that once the show was over, I'd be giving her another challenge. Come hell or high water, we'd have some kind of a performance every six months. Just far enough away for her to aim at but not so far she thought she mightn't make it.

The hafla was a success. Heather danced with a proud lift of her head. No-one outside her own class knew that her new hairdo was, in fact, a wig. And I still have the card saying: 'Thank you for making me believe I could dance.'

It was her birthday that night and after she left the stage, laden down with her birthday cake, I announced that we would be doing a big public show in six months time. Later I mentioned to Heather that I'd like her to dance a duet in that show. And left before she could argue with me.

By this time Heather was undertaking regular chemotherapy sessions at the Royal Marsden cancer hospital. Each time she'd come straight to class from her chemotherapy session. Very occasionally the chemo would make her too sick to attend, but those times were rare.

The class, and the people in it, clearly gave her strength and support. Apart from her children, I think they were what kept her going through the dark days. She never complained, never sat out, never gave in to her illness.

Her dancing improved and improved. She earned her place dancing that duet. I paired her with Janine, another woman in her forties with no dance background, but who was becoming a beautiful dancer. The two of them shared similar body types, similar colouring and the same calm style threaded with a core of steel.

In our big public show they danced a traditional stick dance from Luxor. Performing in the style of the Ma'alima, the village boss woman, each wielded a long staff; alternately thumping the floor, then twirling it high.

The calm power Heather displayed in that performance mirrored that with which she was conducting her life. We all felt the same awe watching her dancing. And watching her navigate the most frightening thing anyone can experience, with her head held high.

Thumping the ground and refusing to give in.

People often ask me what happened to Heather. Remarkably she is still alive, five years later. Advances in cancer treatment are keeping up with her illness and although she says 'one day this thing will kill me' it hasn't got her yet.

Heather's story will be a central one in the film and she can't quite believe that one day she might be portrayed by a famous actress - it's the most exciting thing she could ever imagine. The only request she has made is that she isn't portrayed as 'the sick one' - an object of pity. And we have already made steps to ensure that won't happen (several Hollywood writers wanted to do just that, but were turned down.)

I've kept Heather updated every step of the way along the film's journey. Always keeping her involved, always ensuring she has something exciting to look forward to in the future.

And then in January she went quiet. She stopped answering her phone, stopped responding to my texts. I feared the worst and I wasn't far wrong.

She's been diagnosed with a brain tumour. It's in the cerebellum and is impossible to operate on. She heard last week that she may be able to have a cyber-surgery on it - a futuristic sounding operation which may work. But of course it's expensive. She has to wait six weeks to hear if Croydon will fund the operation. But in this era of cutbacks I'm really concerned for her. If nothing else, I just want so much for her to be alive when the film comes out. To join me in walking along the red carpet to the premiere. To see herself immortalised on celluloid.

Heather is the reason why on Sunday I will be leading a group of bellydancers around the 5 kilometre route of Cancer Research's Race for Life in Lloyds Park, Croydon. Every year I get up at the crack of dawn for several Sundays in a row to teach thousands of women to bellydance as part of the warm up for the Races for Life in several London locations. I always do it for Heather (and for my husband Paul, who also had cancer, and survived.)

I'm telling you this story now because I'd like to ask you to help the work of Cancer Research by donating towards my fundraising for Race for Life. I know we can't even begin to raise the funds that would be necessary to enable Heather to have that life-saving surgery, but we can at least help towards the work of Cancer Research - a charity that receives no government funding (everything comes from donations) but that has made a major impact in the fight against cancer. So many people, like Heather, are surviving this frightening disease and living much longer than anyone thought possible even five years ago, because of the work of organisations such as Cancer Research.

I have set up a Just Giving page, which makes it very easy to donate. To get to it, just click here. Even the tiniest amount will make a difference - as Cancer Research says: 'Together we CAN fight cancer.'

Thank you so much for reading.

Heather's name has been changed in this story (although many of you know her and know who I am writing about.)