Champion battles cancer

Record-breaking defending Golden Shears woolhandling champion Joanne Kumeroa knows even the slightest effort can be quite devastating as she battles cancer, but it's not stopping her from enjoying life or doing her bit to help others.

Like competing in yesterday's heats in a bid to qualify for her 14th Golden Shears final and a seventh title in a competition career spanning 24 years, or later shearing in an all-female event as a promotion and fundraiser for cancer research.

Amazingly, she qualified ninth on a list of 16 for the woolhandling quarter-finals to be held this morning and, while desperately wanting to shear the night event, how much she would be involved depended on her condition during the day.

The 43-year-old, born in Wanganui, raised in the woolsheds of the Maniatoto, Central Otago, and now based in Hamilton, Victoria, Australia, hadn't competed for a year and concedes there've been doubts she would ever do so again, after she had to go into chemotherapy immediately after learning in August that she had cervical cancer.

In an interview before competing yesterday, Kumeroa said a group of about 20 people "close to me" heeded her advice to get checked. "I've helped save two.

"They're getting themselves fixed. But they wouldn't have known.

"For me, it is a bit scary.

"But I didn't come here [to the Golden Shears] for me, I'm here for all those other women who may have cancer, and need to do something about it."

Kumeroa feels "spoilt" to have so many friends in an industry and sport which is overwhelmingly endowed with camaraderie, support and help.

The first hint of any problem was blood clots last year and she went to a doctor to be told she should get a scan as soon as possible.

"Admittedly, I was going to just drive away," she said.

But she fronted up to find that a hysterectomy was needed immediately.

The operation was not possible and, so, treatment began.

At the same time, Kumeroa had to deal with a new problem - the recovery of 17-year-old daughter Kendall, who had broken her neck in a motorcycle crash near Guyra, NSW.

"I had to physically bring her back on to her feet," she said, keeping her own plight secret.

"I just had to swallow mine and concentrate on my daughter," she said.

Kumeroa has tried not to think about her situation, but was devastated when she began losing her hair.

She says: "I didn't handle it well, but then we shaved it off. It blew my mind, I hated it."

Her treatment is being carried out at the Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre in Melbourne, Australia's only public hospital specialising in cancer, and after a week back here, she's off to continue with it next week.

Kumeroa grew up in a woolshed. A photograph depicts her helping with the washing at the age of about 2 in Central Otago where mum Heather was cooking for a shearing gang run by George Potae, of Milton.

By 14, she was working regularly in the sheds and, skipping the lower grades, entered her first competition at Alexandra in 1989. Six months later, she competed in her first Golden Shears final, eventually winning in 1995, 2001, 2004, and 2010-2012.