‘MY BIGGEST MOTIVATION is staying alive for my children’

Julia Bradbury shares her inspirational story of resilience, her passion for life and why she’ll always remain positive

- GEMMA CALVERT

Julia Bradbury is in London's Holland Park admiring the fractal patterns of nature when a class of chattering primary-school children parade past, a vision of fluorescent high-vis. 'How lovely is that?' smiles the former BBC Countryfile presenter.

Having grown up in the East Midlands and Yorkshire, Julia has always been appreciative of her surroundings. Childhood walks in the Peak District, close to where she went to school in Sheffield, paved the way for a career in natural world programming, and she has long been an advocate of green therapy.

It's why, one week before her woman&home cover shoot, we're meeting for her interview in one of her favourite open spaces in London.

'I've promised myself that I will be outside every single day. I want to feel the daylight, whether it's rain or shine,' says Julia. 'Being among trees reduces your stress levels, increases love hormone oxytocin, can lower blood pressure and just makes you feel happy!

Sat beside Julia, who started out on cable channel Live TV before becoming GMTV's LA correspondent, the feel-good energy is palpable and she says her gratitude for life has 'heightened' since being diagnosed with breast cancer. She went public with her illness in September 2021, before last October announcing a life-saving skin and nipple-saving mastectomy on Twitter. A moving ITV documentary, Julia Bradbury: Breast Cancer and Me, laid bare her treatment and a deeply emotional journey alongside her property-developer partner, Gerard Cunningham, their son, Zephyr, 11, and seven-year-old twin girls, Xanthe and Zena.

Now 'six months out the other side', the 6cm tumour, two lymph glands and her left breast are gone, and Julia's spirit is unyielding. Brimming with medical and scientific knowledge, she is striving to live as healthily as possible to minimise the risk of breast cancer recurrence.