Julia Bradbury is enjoying her second act.
"I love being in my fifties, bar a cancer diagnosis," she tells HELLO!. "There is a confidence and wisdom that comes with being a little bit older. I feel I know how to handle life's challenges a little bit more."
And there have been hard times to navigate. Last week, the former Countryfile presenter, who was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2021 and underwent a double mastectomy a month later, posted on Instagram a video of herself hugging a cherry blossom tree.
"Here's what I always try to come back to, especially during the hard stretches," she wrote. "The small wins. The tiny moments of unexpected joy."
"Sometimes everything seems as though it's happening at the same time," says Julia, 55. “In an ideal world, all the tough times would come one at a time, with lovely spaces in between them, so you could recalibrate. But life doesn't work like that.
"Sometimes, on heavy days, it's like: ‘Oh, just give me a glimmer.’ What's been life-changing for me is to shift my mindset, so that I'm always on the lookout for good things."
Julia recently revealed that a full-body preventative MRI scan had identified a brain cyst, which she had followed up on. "It's nothing to worry about," she says now. "It's a benign cyst; it's very small."
Julia's wellness routine
The broadcaster, who has three children – Zephyr, 14, and twins Xanthe and Zena, 11 – with her partner, the property developer Gerard Cunningham, has been open about the methods she has employed to boost her health and wellbeing with the aim of preventing the recurrence of cancer.
Now, she says, she is focused on "making small, incremental changes; it's about the small habits".
She's particularly keen on eating healthily, removing the sweets drawer at home and drinking bone broth for breakfast; she even packed her own mackerel and blueberries to take on a recent work outing.
These decisions can make life more difficult, she admits. "It makes socialising harder. If I'm going to meet someone, I really have to consider: 'Is there going to be something there that's healthy enough for me?’
"It's tough, and it does take planning," she says. "I've sacrificed a lot of things; I don't drink alcohol any more. I do allow myself treats. I think I'm devoted – I don't think I'm obsessed."
Supporting Big Give
A wildlife aficionado, she recently travelled to Antarctica for ITV’s Wonders of the Frozen South series, enjoying "incredible encounters with humpback whales". She has also been a dedicated patron of the Whale and Dolphin Conservation (WDC) for eight years.
Proving her passion for environmentalism, Julia is speaking to us as part of the Big Give's Earth Raise 2026.
The campaign is aiming to raise over £10m for more than 330 environmental charities, including the WDC, via “champion funders” that double donations by members of the public.
"Whales and marine life are a massive passion of mine, and I've been lucky enough to have filmed with whales throughout my career. There's nothing more spectacular. I'm just sad that we still have to say 'save the whale'."
Big Give, the UK’s leading match-funding platform, has launched Earth Raise 2026. As the UK and global communities face escalating environmental challenges from nature loss to extreme weather, the need for urgent collective action has never been clearer.
Running from 22–29 April, every donation made through the platform will be doubled, thanks to a record-breaking £5 million in match funding from a coalition of major philanthropic partners.
Big Give’s Earth Raise 2026 ends on 29 April. To find out more and to donate, visit donate.biggive.org/earth-raise-2026
