BRAVE Nicky Williams has a very personal reason for running Race for Life this year - she's spent the past eight months battling breast cancer.

The 45-year-old mum-of-two has to wait until the end of this month to find out if the cancerous lump has completely disappeared or whether she will have to undergo further surgery.

However, that won't stop Nicky and her family, friends and workmates from joining the thousands of women on Southampton Common in a bid to raise vital funds for Cancer Research UK next Sunday.

It was in October last year that Nicky discovered a lump the size of a satsuma in her breast.

Nicky said: "When you are looking for breast cancer you are looking for something the size of a Smartie, but mine wasn't.

"They thought it was mastitis and at first I was treated with antibiotics but a month later it had grown to the size of an orange."

"It was what every woman dreads, being told the news."

Nicky, who lives with her husband Chris, 46, and her 15-year-old son and 17-year-old daughter in Otterbourne, near Winchester, was treated with chemotherapy and radiotherapy during which she lost her hair.

"It's the worst thing. I just feel so sorry for people going through it, it's frightening."

When the terrible news sank in Nicky spent a whole night writing letters to her children to tell them everything she could think of.

"I thought that was it, I thought it was throughout my body because of the size of the lump. I thought Christmas was the last one I would be spending with my family."

Nicky has come through her treatment and is raring to step out at next week's big run.

The group will be wearing T-shirts, donated by Tesco in Hamble, which will be individually decorated and members of the public will be asked: "Vote for me and pay 20p" to help raise extra cash.

Nicky said: "I'm really looking forward to it. You only hear the stories of those who lose the battle, not those who have won."