Kate Nicholas (UK)

Kate Nicholas (UK)

Kate Nicholas is a 56-year-old author, broadcaster and storyteller. She started learning ballet again in Silver Swans ballet classes after recovering from cancer.

I have spent most of my life working with words – as a communications and media professional. My most recent role was as Global Communications Chief for Christian aid agency World Vision. I spent about 50 per cent of my time flying around the world. I thought nothing of running meetings in Asia one day and in Africa the next. But four years ago my life was turned upside down when I was diagnosed with advanced breast cancer which I was told had spread around my heart. At the time I was told that, even if it was possible, surgery was unlikely given how much time I had left.

As a wife and a mother of two school-aged children, it was a very tough thing to hear. But from the outset, my family and I refused to give up hope – and the fact that I am talking today shows that something amazing happened – against all odds I survived and have been clear of cancer for four years.

While I was ill I decided to write a memoir as a legacy for my children – I wanted them to know how I had seen the world – and the resulting book Sea Changed has now gone to be a best-seller. I have since stepped out of World Vision, am now writing my third book and my second TV series and training to be ordained as a priest in the Church of England.

I was crazy about dance when I was a child. I saw my first ballet when I was only four years old and have seen some of the greats including Margot Fonteyn and Rudolf Nureyev, as well as the Kirov and the Bolshoi. I attended ballet classes until I was about 16 and when I was going through cancer treatments I would imagine myself dancing again. I was in a great deal of pain and my body was so ravaged by the chemo that I hardly recognised myself, but my imaginary dancing really helped me to hold onto a sense of myself that wasn’t defined by cancer. Then when I amazingly recovered, I saw a news story about the launch of the Royal Academy of Dance’s Sliver Swans and as soon as I was strong enough I joined a local class held at Elev8 Dance Studios in Bedford.

I was incredibly nervous. I wasn’t a bad dancer when I was younger but there was always more enthusiasm than expertise – it was fairly obvious by the age of 13 that I was not going to be able to be able to make ballet my career. I have to admit I haven’t found it easy going back to dancing. I seem to have lost much of my muscle memory and I still get very tired. I am no Darcey Bussell but dancing has helped me to reconnect with my body, and to feel joy in the sense of movement again.

I have been very open about the fact that I am doing dance classes on all my social media platforms and in my blog – and the result has been overwhelmingly positive. I decided at the outset to share my journey through cancer on social media in the hope of helping others who were faced with this awful condition. I have been so blessed to have a second chance at life and to be able to express my joy at being alive through dance – and people seem to find this idea inspiring.

Dancing has really helped me physically in terms of increasing my stamina and flexibility, but it has also helped me mentally. Since having chemotherapy I have found that my short term memory has not been so good, but remembering the routines has helped to retune my memory circuits! At 56 I am one of the younger members of my Silver Swans class, but I have been so inspired by some the older women who are dancing into their 70s and 80s. I can see how it helps to keep them young in body and mind.

Unlike most of the ladies at my class, I am still working full time as an author, as a lay preacher and also as a communications consultant. I believe that variety is the spice of life and when I decided to step down from my role at World Vision, I decided that I wanted a portfolio life that would enable me to get involved in lots of different projects. The danger is that you end up doing too much; I have to make sure that I maintain a good work-life balance. Committing to take time out to dance once a week has helped me to maintain that balance.

I think that life should be about exploration, whether of places, people or experiences. Life is so much more fulfilling when you keep on learning and I intend to be in exploration mode until I draw my very last breath.

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