Mum and daughter start Chester Race For Life after both survive cancer diagnosis
Suzanne and Victoria Green may look like any other mother and daughter, but they are connected by a unique and unwanted bond.
Both of them were diagnosed with cancer in a very short time, and both have survived.
For Victoria her diagnosis came like a bolt out of the blue, as she explains: "I was 30 at the time, it wasn't even on my radar, anything like that.
"When I was diagnosed I just cried and cried, I was so upset."
Her cancer was particularly aggressive and her treatment was equally taxing for her, needing a mastectomy and losing her hair.
With the help of her medical team she was eventually given the all-clear, but there was more terrible news for her when her mum Suzanne discovered that she too had the condition.
Suzanne recalls: "I got Hodgkin Lymphoma, so that was such a shock.
"After what the whole family had been through, to tell them was my worst fear.
"I just didn't want to tell them."
Victoria adds: "When she told me I was so upset, I started crying again, I think we were all in tears.
"Exactly a year from when I was having my diagnosis as well, it was just the worst luck."
Now they're both cancer-free and they've been chosen to start Cancer Research UK's (CRUK) Race For Life in Chester.
In more than 30 years since it was set up the Race For Life has raised almost a billion pounds for the charity, and CRUK's Richard Healey says that there is one aim: "Every pound raised at Cancer Research UK's Race For Life will go towards our research into all 200 types of cancer, with the aim that by 2034 3 in 4 of us will survive our cancer diagnosis for 10 years or more."
Having blown the starting horn Suzanne and Victoria will walk the course when the event gets underway at Chester Race Course this Sunday, as Suzanne isn't quite up to full fitness yet.
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