Mum who translated for stars on Disney's 'Welcome to Wrexham' reveals secret cancer battle

A Welsh mum who appeared on Disney's 'Welcome to Wrexham' as a translator for Hollywood stars Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney, has opened up about her secret cancer ordeal. Journalist Maxine Hughes, 45, who delighted fans by teasing both the A-list stars as they struggled with the Welsh language, has just finished her 20th gruelling round of chemotherapy.

The mum who is married to Sally Ayhan, 42 and who has two young boys, Iori, 12 and Manu, 7, told how she kept news of her diagnosis of triple negative cancer within her close family and friends.

But her few trusted confidants including Rob’s family, particularly his step-mum Jill, who have made it a “million times” easier during a traumatic and “dark” six months.

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TV and radio Journalist Maxine told after hearing the devastating diagnosis she was left fearing she would not see her children grow up. She is now facing a double mastectomy which she has agreed to have filmed for a documentary, giving an uncensored account of her cancer journey. They will be using Maxine’s story as a lens, looking at the challenges the NHS in England and the waiting times in Wales, are facing rising levels of cancer.

Maxine, originally from Conwy but now lives and works in Washington DC, spoke to The Mirror during her last chemo session in Virginia on Thursday. “It’s called red devil,” she explains about the strong chemo pumping into her veins.

Opening up about her cancer diagnosis, she said: “Until recently the word cancer was almost like a death sentence. You hear it and you go, ‘oh my god, am I gonna die?’ You suddenly go to the worst place and you start thinking ‘can I stay alive for five years? Can I get my kids to school?’

“It's definitely a really dark place, but then you start the treatment and you have to just get on with it. Having two very energetic boys has forced me to stay active, to keep getting up for early morning sports practice. I’ve had very little time to stop and get depressed.”

Maxine was in Australia for Christmas, visiting her wife’s family, when she discovered a lump, a few days after the heartbreaking news her dad John, had died aged 80.

“When I was there my dad, who was suffering from dementia, got very sick and died. It was a terrible time. My wife had taken the kids out on a day trip to give me some space and some quiet because I was in shock and I was upset. I was sitting there and I put my hand on my chest and thought, ‘oh my God, there's a lump and it’s quite a big one’. ”

Maxine said “it was hard to believe” because she’d only had a clear mammogram in October and “checked all the time”. When she got home, broadcaster Maxine was sent to LA to cover the wildfires.

“I was running around in the thick of it with a mask on my face protecting me from the smoke, but all the while, little did I know, I had a very, very aggressive tumor and cancer growing.

Maxine booked in to get a mammogram as soon as she got back and the radiologist told her straight away: ‘I can see that it's cancer’.

“As a journalist I've covered so many stories about cancer, whether it's about waiting times or a new treatment. So it was such a weird, surreal experience becoming my own story. I remember the moment very clearly, I almost fainted. I was in such shock.” Maxine was further left shattered when she was told after a biopsy her cancer was Triple Negative.

“It was almost a bigger shock than finding out I had cancer. It's such an aggressive type of cancer it's really scary, they started chemotherapy straight away.”

In the documentary she wants to be ‘candid’ about what she has been through, including a lot of ‘weird stuff” she experienced during chemo.

“The hair loss was traumatic and the worst part for me. But no one really told me about things like; nails falling off, stuff getting in my eyes all the time due to lack of eyelashes, terrible, consistent bloating, swelling and water retention.”

She is responding well to treatment and next month will have a double mastectomy which she has agreed to film to help other women followed by minimal reconstruction surgery.

“It is an incredibly invasive surgery that will drastically change you physically as a woman. And I think that personally I haven't found enough out there. It's like you've got to save your breasts. There's quite a pressure on women, like it's part of your femininity.

“But I don't want the tissue. That’s the conversation I want out there, it's okay if you don't want to do anything and not have any reconstruction. I didn’t want to save them. I want to cut them off. “

Surgeons have put her mastectomy on hold for a week so she can return home to Wales to receive a top Welsh honour at this year's National Eisteddfod in Wrexham.

“When I return I am going to be thinking of my dad every step of the way. His family are from Wrexham. It really is an amazing end to a traumatic few months.“

The mum says she will forever be grateful to Rob and Ryan, explaining: “It's been so much more than just a bit of television for a documentary series. Maxine says the series has helped her reconnect with her Wrexham roots.

She says she got the job after answering an ad, and explains: “I mean everybody in the US who speaks Welsh knows each other. So they sent me the casting call notices. “I was like, ‘oh, it's a joke, it’s not real’. So I called them and I just said, is this real? And they said, ‘it is real and every Welsh speaker in America's been calling us’.”

She soon became a viewers favourite when she appeared first in the promo for the series, standing slightly apart from the stars, to translate for them. In the hilarious scene she sighs and looks disgruntled as she ‘secretly’ tells viewers in Welsh: ‘The tall skinny one does movies. The muscular one sells cream cheese from Philadelphia or something…there is no way these two can manage a football club.’

Maxine said: “Actually, when we shot the promo it was the first time they’d met each other in person but it was as if they'd known each other for years.

“We had a script but usually with Rob and Ryan, they ad-lib so much, they sort of bounce off each other. At first I think people thought it was a joke, they thought it was satire. But I was really aware of the fact that it needed to be me making fun of them and not making fun of Welsh.”

She said Rob’s Welsh is the best of the two and his dad is “pretty good, too”. “I think Rob's probably tried a little bit more to learn more. But they’re both really respectful about the need to incorporate the language into everything they do and it's a very difficult language for an American to learn. “

About the show she said: “Wrexham has played such a positive role in my life for the last few years.

“For me it’s been a reconnection with Wrexham and also for my children to be able to form that connection.

“And it's also introduced me to so many people that I would never have otherwise met and people who've become really important to us as a family.

“I think you see with Rob and Ryan it's always been more than just about buying a football team or making TV. It's been about investing in a part of the UK, part of Wales that needed a bit of attention.

“They've respected the community, they've respected the team and the football club and what it means to the area. And the Welsh language too. Rob’s family are an extension of that warmth and kindness and positivity and I feel so lucky to have been introduced to them.

“Wrexham is such a strong community of people, and it's them that have made the success.

“Of course, they've had help from two people from Hollywood but none of this would have been possible without the community of Wrexham. I don't even know where else in the world you can find that, it's a very unique place.”