An ICU nurse who was eight when her mum died from breast cancer and is desperate to see her sons grow up has had life changing surgery to remove her breasts and ovaries after inheriting the BRCA1 gene mutation making her more susceptible to cancer in both.
Ruth Cookson, 34, lost her own mother Monika Harrison in 1996, aged just 41, but her own fear of dying young only hit after her first son Seb, nine, was born in July 2012, prompting her to go for genetic testing a few months later in September.
