→I
n the beginning, there were seven
other women in the Sydney breast
cancer clinic with Valerie Taylor.
They endured fear and pain side
by side, swapped stories, shared
secrets and encouraged each
other through the awful side effects of
chemotherapy. As time passed, they
continued to meet for lunch or coffee
while their numbers gradually,
inexorably dwindled. Ultimately, only
two of them were left. And then, sadly,
Valerie became the sole survivor of
their friendship group.
Aged 50, the vibrant Australian
diver renowned for swimming with
sharks had taken on humanity’s most
pitiless predator – cancer – and lived
to tell the tale, despite the direst of
medical predictions.
“I was told I had only a 25 per cent
chance of surviving,” says Valerie, now
83 and revealing her cancer struggle
for the first time after more than three
decades. “The doctors thought I
wouldn’t make it, but I knew I would.
“It’s peculiar because the other seven
women in the clinic had a better
prognosis than me, yet they all died.
One by one they dropped off until
there was just the two of us. I asked the
other lovely woman, Liz, not to tell me
if her cancer came back. But she did.”
Valerie’s pale aqua eyes fill fleetingly
with pain as she gazes towards Sydney
Heads, the harbour an unwrinkled
blue expanse on this sparkly