Amy Dowden of Strictly Come Dancing recalls a terrible near-death experience while undergoing cancer treatment.
The professional dancer, 33, disclosed earlier this year that she had stage 3 breast cancer.
She’s since had a single mastectomy and is undergoing chemotherapy after doctors discovered new malignancies, forcing her to leave Strictly 2023.
Amy has been keeping her followers up to speed on social media, including a recent video of her bravely shaving her head following terrible hair loss.
In a new interview, Amy has now revealed she came close to dying during her chemotherapy treatment, saying: ‘After both my first cycles I developed the life-threatening side-effects that can come with chemo, so I had it all in the first month.’
She continued: ‘I had a temperature and didn’t realise the severity of having a temperature.
‘I stood up, collapsed, Mum rang the emergency number and they said “phone an ambulance immediately”. From there everything got very serious.’
Amy went on to The Mirror: ‘I remember going into hospital and them telling me I had an infection, but the following day it got very bad, I was unresponsive to antibiotics for hours.
‘My last memory is a load of doctors around me in the early hours of Sunday morning. On Monday a nurse explained I had gone into septic shock.
‘They said my blood pressure was that low my vital organs would have started failing.’
Amy, who is unable to recall much from the time she spent in intensive care, continued to explain that she had a low heart rate and ‘severely’ low blood pressure, while her infection markers were at ‘dangerous levels’.
Amy eventually reacted to the third type of antibiotic after being treated with three different types.
She was then advised that if she had gone to bed instead of being brought to the hospital that night, she might not have woken up the next morning.
Amy has previously spoken about suffering from sepsis, saying: ‘I didn’t want to go into hospital; at the time I didn’t realise how ill I was.’
‘The doctors and nurses were telling me I had sepsis and that it was life-threatening, but I wasn’t taking it in,’ she added.
Amy celebrated reaching the halfway point of her chemotherapy in a recent social media update as she prepared for round 5.
She later returned to Strictly Come Dancing for a special performance, thanking her co-stars for their continuous support.
She wrote: ‘I’m so lucky to be surrounded by so much support which I don’t take for granted and days like here is what keeps me going.
‘I’m dreaming every night of dancing on that floor again but right now I’m my fellow pro’s proudest and biggest cheerleader.’
Strictly Come Dancing returns on Saturday at 6.20pm on BBC One and BBC iPlayer.
Macmillan cancer support
If you or someone you care about has been diagnosed with cancer, Macmillan can offer support and information.
You can contact their helpline on 0808 808 00 00 (7 days a week from 8am to 8pm), use their webchat service, or visit their site for more information.
