Some of you may not know who Jade Goody is; I didn’t either until I started reading the British papers a couple of years ago.

She was a working-class girl who shot to fame and fortune by just being herself on the UK version of Big Brother, and she died on Sunday (UK’s Mother’s Day) at the young age of 27 from cervical cancer:

Jade’s young sons awoke on Mothering Sunday to the heartbreaking news she had died in the night.

Five year-old Bobby and his brother Freddie, four, were told by their father Jeff Brazier that ‘mummy has gone to heaven’.

Her mother Jackiey, husband Jack, 21, and close friend Kevin Adams were by her bedside when she slipped away.

According to Mr [Max] Clifford she has been heavily sedated throughout most of her final week in a bid to control the pain.

‘In recent days she slipped deeper and deeper into unconsciousness,’ he said. ‘The last 24 hours she has been pretty much in a coma.” [...]

Jade discovered she had cervical cancer last August while taking part in the Indian version of Big Brother. She was told the disease had spread to her bowel and liver and was terminal in January.

Even by her own account, she wasn’t a very bright girl (she once said, ““I am intelligent but I let myself down because I can’t speak properly or spell,” and thought Rio de Janeiro was a soccer player), but the public could not get enough of her.  Her career in the spotlight had many ups and downs, and Jade was embroiled in a racial scandal when she returned to the BB house and became involved in bullying Bollywood actress Shilpa Shetty.  She and Miss Shetty had later spoken and patched things up (she flew to the UK in hopes of seeing Jade before she died, but Jade was too ill), and Jade agreed to go on the Indian version of the show to try and restore some of her image, but not before Jade took a beating in the press and saw her once-lucrative career start to dry up.

Once she arrived in India and began filming the series, she had only been in the house for two days when she received the news that she had cervical cancer and was to return to the UK immediately for treatment.  However, even after a hysterectomy and aggressive treatment for the disease over the course of several months, Jade was told that her cancer was terminal and there was nothing left the doctors could do.

She had starred in other reality television shows about her life; but in a unique twist, she decided to sell the rights to her wedding (her new husband had his police curfew lifted for the night so he could be there) and other events concerning her last days in an attempt to put aside money for the care of her two young sons and has paid their school tuition until they are sixteen.  She could have splurged on herself, but that wasn’t Jade…it was all about her sons:

JADE’S sons have been left financially secure with a £4million legacy from their mum.

She was raised in the back streets of Bermondsey, South East London. Her dad Andrew was a drug addict and jailbird.

But she was always determined to succeed — and Bobby, five, and Freddie, four, are guaranteed a better start in life than she had.

She once said: “I’ve always wanted my family to have what I never could, no matter what it might cost.

“I wanted to get Bobby into a private school. It costs over two grand a term, but I was willing to put all my savings into giving my kids a good education.”

Jade had four separate procedures to remove abnormal cells, but ignored the last two letters asking her to return:

Jade Goody ignored a letter warning her she needed to have abnormal cells removed from her cervix because she was too scared to go back to hospital.

The 27-year-old Big Brother star, who is now fighting advanced cervical cancer, had already had three abnormal smear tests and after each had endured an operation to remove the cells.

But after her fourth abnormal smear she ignored a letter telling her to return to hospital, instead hoping it would go away on its own.

‘When I heard I had more abnormal cells I thought, “this is the fourth time I’ve been told I need to have the same operation now,’ she told Heat Magazine.

‘Once you have them burnt off they shouldn’t come back, I was too scared.’

It was only after the mother-of-two collapsed from blood loss on August 5, for the fourth time in four years, that she realised she couldn’t ignore her condition.

‘The doctors were doing tests for my blood loss - but they seemed unclear about what it could be. It was then that I was told I must have another operation on the dodgy cells on my cervix.

‘They’d sent a letter to me ages ago telling me I needed to go in, but I’d been too scared to do anything about it.’

Jade’s first had an abnormal smear test when she was just 16.

‘Even before I was sexually active, I had to have pre-cancerous cells removed. And that nearly traumatised me for life, it was so painful.’

After collapsing in August Jade was warned that she could be facing a terminal illness, but she decided to go ahead with her trip to India. She reasoned that the £100,000 fee would be needed to raise her two young sons if she fell ill.

Jade’s life was not easy nor was it pretty, and it was often cringe-worthy and maddening, but it was real.  Truth be told, she wasn’t the brightest, nor the smartest, nor the prettiest, and her life was often a series of one embarassing blunders after another.  In many ways, it was a textbook example of the horrible things that happen to a naive person thrust into an unforgiving spotlight shone by a world ready to devour its wounded.

But Jade had the last word, by taking her ill begotten fame and turning it around into a vehicle for getting cancer screenings in the public eye.  If nothing else, Jade’s choice to chronicle her struggle with cancer in the ever-present lens of the camera serves to remind us that nobody is immune to cancer.  This isn’t just a problem dealt with by the old or infirm, or a far-off event that may or may not happen to us when we reach a “certain age”; it strikes the young and healthy as well, and often without warnings or with easily-rationalized symptoms.  It should serve as a wake-up call to women that we need to take care of our bodies, that we need to be diligent with screenings and follow-ups and doctor appointments.  There are no other reliable ways of screening for these types of cancer, and a few moments of embarrassment and discomfort is worth it.

I normally detest “reality” contestants, but in this case her reality was so real that it hammered home a very important point.  So…in honor of Jade, I am going to call and make an appointment with my doctor for a checkup of all things female.  It’s time…I’ve put it off long enough.  And I urge any woman out there reading to do the same…it is the best way to honor her memory.

“I could b*tch about dying young,” she said in her last days, “but at the end of the day, I can look back on my life and be proud of what I have achieved.”

Source: k