Mum diagnosed with cancer and told she had months to live seven years ago turns 40

• Watch Heidi Loughlin speak to ITV News

A North Somerset mum with terminal cancer is celebrating turning 40 despite being told by doctors she had just 12 months to live back in 2015.

Heidi Loughlin was pregnant with her third child Ally when she was diagnosed with an aggressive form of breast cancer.

Despite the dangers it posed for her health, she delayed chemotherapy treatment in order to give Ally the best chance of survival. Sadly Ally died just days after being born.

Seven years later, Heidi is celebrating a huge milestone her doctors didn't think she would reach, as she turns 40.

Heidi told ITV News West Country: "I feel amazing. I'm still having chemotherapy every three weeks and I will do forever. But I'm so lucky."

Heidi was told she only had one year to live when she her cancer first spread.

"I should have basically died at the end of 2016," she said. "Nobody imagined I'd make my 40th birthday - it was just never going to happen."

Heidi has beaten the odds and gone onto to campaign for breast cancer awareness, raising thousands of pounds for neonatal intensive care units.

"It's just about having that sheer determination not to be a statistic and not to conform to what i've been repeatedly told is going to happen to me," she said.

In 2019 Heidi wrote a book dedicated to her two sons where she detailed her battle with cancer in a bid to show them how she was if she dies.

She said: "I did not want my kids lives to be swallowed up by all the dark things that were happening and I just kept going and before I knew it those months turned to years."

Heidi has had a mastectomy and reconstructive surgery a few years ago and still regularly gets treatment.

"This is my third line of treatment," she said. "It's like an immunotherapy and chemotherapy mashup.

"It's an amazing drug that works really well for some but not for others. For me, it's been absolutely groundbreaking.

"It's been the difference between me being poorly all the time and a normal life."

Her advice to others with the disease is to "enjoy everything you can while you can".

She added: "Nobody has control over when they're going to die - we've all got that in common and you can spend all that time completely terrified up until that day or you can choose to live as much as you can.

"Otherwise you're doing yourself a disservice by saying 'no I'm going to die from cancer' - but what if you don't, what if you've live for 10 years but in all that fear?

"There's no way I want that for myself or for my children."