[*TikkaB*]

Hello all,

I am on such a high. I have just completed a photo shoot that BCAA has asked for submissions for that will be used to raise funds for breast cancer.

I have just revealed just how I now look after my breast cancer journey - everyone will be able to see me, post therapy - in the raw.

I was a dancer as part of the entertainment for the first ever 'Think Pink Ball', and never thought that I would be on the receiving end of breast cancer myself. I have a very rare form of breast cancer (IBD/IBC) that no one knows how to treat as it is very rare, very hard to detect and treatment is up in the air (at best, questionable in the public health system). Well I am, and I am a survivor.

The BCAA has asked a number of high-profile photographers to submit an entry to be auctioned off to raise funds for research, and my photographer picked me and my DD(8) as her subjects.

We have had many people lend us studio space, props and clothes - to them all I give my heart-felt thanks.

My photographer was loaned a $90,000 camera which had to be flown up to Sydney for the shoot - and the quality of the images just has to be seen to be believed.

I spent the day under halogen lamps to capture the kind of retro, burlesque, glamour type of image that has been part of my life style as a performer and as a woman. (My daughter saw me under natural lighting and was concerned that I would look even older and more tired than I normally do until I explained how the intense lighting would wash 'normal' make up out).

Of course I wish someone had done this kind of shoot with me when I was younger and before breast cancer stuck - but what the hey - at least I've lived to do this.

If anyone wants to attend the exhibition in Melbourne next month, please PM me.

[i-candi]

Well done, that sounds amazing

So awesome that you can share and raise awareness.

Good luck for the exhibition, please post links so that those of us that don't live in Melbourne can see (if it's possible that is).