WHEN Leona Levey was diagnosed with breast cancer, she refused to let it stop her rising to life's challenges. Now her husband Steven has been inspired to take part in the Moonwalk and raise funds in her memory
THOSE whose lives have been blighted by breast cancer know only too well how indiscriminately it can strike, irrespective of age, social class or outlook on life.
Seven years ago, aged just 33, Leona Levey received the diagnosis that was to tear
her world apart. "Leona was a hugely positive person," says her husband Steven. "She worked with disadvantaged kids; kids who'd been in trouble. She taught dangerous kids, violent children – and loved every second of it.
"We were devastated beyond belief when she was diagnosed," he says. "We were scared, worried, upset, feeling hard done by, but we faced it head on and got on with it."
They were also determined never to hide anything from their children – Aaron, who was ten, and Courtnay, who was six – no matter how painful the truth might be. "It meant we would never have to have secret conversations, we could talk openly in the house and with close family about what was going on whether the kids were there or not."
Leona had a mastectomy, then radiotherapy for a month and chemotherapy for a year. She was one of the first people in Scotland to be put on Herceptin, and she seemed to reacting well for a year and a half. "Then that stopped working," says Steven. "She got more chemo – in total, in seven years, she had about six different types of chemotherapy, radiotherapy about three or four times and she lost her hair three or four times. But she never complained, never moaned or had a bad word to say about anything – except, perhaps, to me. She very much took her cancer and put it in a box, and when it was treatment days or test days, that was when she had it; the rest of the time she didn't. She just got on with her life."
Leona did her first Moonwalk in 2006, when she was between treatments. She did it again in 2007 "She was getting chemotherapy," says Steven, "and had no skin on the soles of her feet, but she did it anyway." And last year she was too ill to walk but acted as a marshal. "It was a target for her," he says. "She got a tremendous sense of achievement from doing it; a sense of 'I have done something I never thought I'd be able to do'; something no one expected her to do, and it was truly inspiring."
She may well have walked again this year, but around six months ago her condition started deteriorating. "The chemo didn't really appear to be doing very much," says Steven, "and everything was beginning to get a little more difficult. While she was putting a brave face on, it was becoming clear that things weren't great.
"It was one of the few things we didn't really discuss in any great detail. We couldn't talk about the end being close by. Leona always knew this time would come, but we never admitted to each other that the time had arrived."
First she picked up an infection the doctors couldn't seem to treat. Then she lost a lot of weight, along with her strength and energy. She was finding it difficult to walk and was in and out of hospital. "It took six or seven weeks for her to beat the infection," says Steven, "and it was almost like that knocked the last of the stuffing out of her. And because she'd been getting treated for the infection with all sorts of antibiotics, she wasn't being treated for her cancer. Given the aggressive form it took, I think this put the disease in a place where it became very difficult to treat."
By this stage she had secondary cancers in her head and her lungs. "It was time," says Steven. "She just couldn't fight it any more. All the time it was getting a little worse; it was never getting better.
"I spent probably the last two to three weeks at the Marie Curie, just spending time with her. On the final night, she had the most horrifically restless, fighting, troubled night, and looking back it was almost as though she gave it one last huge fight. Then she just got very calm. I got everyone rounded up. Her mum and dad came from Kirkcaldy, her sister from Fife, I got the kids along, my dad had come over from Spain. We managed to get just about everybody there.
"Then her sister said, 'What about Claire?' That was her best friend in the world – they had met at university and done the Moonwalks together. I phoned Claire, let her know now's the time, and she came along.
"Five minutes later, Claire walked out of the room. I walked in and she'd gone. I would swear it was as if she'd waited for Claire to come. She was organised to the end."
Leona died on January 9 this year, having raised in the region of £20,000 for breast cancer research. And this year, in her memory, it's the boys' turn to Walk the Walk. As well as Steven, also donning bras on June 20 will be son Aaron, Leona's brother John Penman, her brother-in-law Alex Donaldson and Claire's husband, Danny Cordiner. Her father, too, was desperate to take part, but he underwent a triple heart bypass around five months ago, so he has been put in charge of marshalling instead. "The girls will be decorating the bras," says Steven. "Courtnay will be doing mine, and I'm told she has already decided on the design. It will be penguins," he says. "When Leona first started teaching she had a primary class who couldn't work out how to say Miss Penman, which was her maiden name, so she became Leona Penguin. There are, in my living room, somewhere in the region of 76 penguins. They're everywhere around the house."
There's no doubt it will be an emotional day, but Steven is determined to finish the event regardless. "I certainly can't not complete it. She did it twice so I have to finish. It's an honour thing."
In the meantime, as well as getting into training for the event, Steven is trying to put his world back together. "I haven't got the faintest idea what I'm going to do. I'm going to look after my kids, but I have to get used to being on my own.
"I've never met anybody who didn't like Leona, never met anybody who had a bad word to say about her. She was truly inspirational, possibly more so now than before. People only now realise how ill she actually was because she hid it so well.
"If she has a legacy, it would be 'Don't take it so seriously, just get on with it'. And I will try to do that."
• The Edinburgh Moonwalk is on June 20, 2009. To find out more see
www.walkthewalk.orgWALK OF LIFEWalk the Walk came into being 12 years ago when 13 women power-walked the New York City Marathon in their bras to raise money and awareness for breast cancer. What started out as a one-off fundraising event, has blossomed into a thriving multi-million pound charity, raising to date in excess of £48 million for vital breast cancer causes.
The charity's flagship events are the Moonwalks in London and Edinburgh, and the Sunwalks in Newcastle and Bristol. But it also organises trips to other parts of the country – and, indeed, the world – to encourage people to take on new challenges and to keep them motivated.
Over the last three years, 30,000 amazing women and men have put on their brightly decorated bras and taken part in Moonwalk Edinburgh, raising a staggering £7.8 million. In the short time that the charity has had a presence in Scotland, it has granted funds to help build a much-needed second Maggie's Centre in Glasgow and enabled the Breast Cancer Institute at the Western General Hospital in Edinburgh to completely rebuild its breast cancer ward, as well as providing the cash for numerous other projects throughout Scotland.
Its not too late to show your support for the Moonwalk, on June 20. The full marathon for men and women is now sold out, but there are still places available for the half-marathon and to act as a volunteer on the night. For further information, contact the charity (01483 741430,
www.walkthewalk.org).
