Strictly Come Dancing professional Amy Dowden has said watching Saturday’s show from the sidelines will be “tough” as she wanted to celebrate one year since finishing chemotherapy on the dancefloor. The Welsh dancer, 34, returned to competing in the BBC show for its 20th anniversary series after missing out last year while undergoing cancer treatment.
However, she was forced to pull out of the competition earlier this week after suffering an insufficiency stress fracture to her foot. Appearing on ITV’s Lorraine on Thursday, she said: “Saturday is going to be tough because I really wanted to be dancing on that floor to show myself how far I’ve had come in one year.”
She explained that Saturday (November 9) is a year since she rang the bell to mark the end of her chemotherapy treatment. The dancer revealed she had planned to dance the samba with her celebrity partner, JLS star JB Gill, as she felt it would be a “joyful carnival happy dance”.
Gill will now be paired with professional Lauren Oakley, who stepped in to replace Dowden on last weekend’s show. After a couple of weeks of rest, Dowden is hoping to return to the Strictly dancefloor in some capacity.
“I’m hoping to dance by the end of series and obviously next year, I got my tour with Carlos – Reborn. I’m determined”, she said. “I’ve had a lot of setbacks in my life, since 11 years old, I’m used to having to pick myself back up and saying ‘Don’t get bitter, get better’, I tell myself and ‘This too shall pass’. And right now, I’m heartbroken, but I know I’ll feel better.”
Last Saturday, Dowden watched in the studio as Gill and Oakley danced to a Bruno Mars medley and earned the joint highest score of this year’s series. Dowden was taken to hospital as a “precaution” after “feeling unwell” following the live show the previous weekend and missed the Sunday results programme, her representative said at the time.
Dowden found a lump in her breast the day before her honeymoon to the Maldives with fellow professional dancer Ben Jones, and was unable to compete on Strictly 2023. After treatment for stage three breast cancer including having a mastectomy and chemotherapy, she announced in February that tests showed she had “no evidence of disease”.
The Caerphilly-born dancer has documented both her cancer journey and living with Crohn’s disease on a number of BBC shows. She fronted the BBC programme Strictly Amy: Crohn’s And Me, which she said helped her “accept” her own condition for the “first time ever” after meeting other people with the bowel disease.
Dowden said the BBC show encouraged her to front Strictly Amy: Cancer And Me, in which she spoke about her fertility and health issues.
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