Bernadette Hagans features in
Our Lives: The Girl With the Colourful Leg
In 2018, Bernadette Hagans from Belfast, was diagnosed with synovial sarcoma, a rare cancer which develops in cells around joints and tendons.
Her right leg was amputated from the knee down and she had to learn to walk again using a prosthetic limb.
Despite this, she felt lucky to be given a chance to live and a week after being discharged from hospital, was signed as a model.
Our Lives: The Girl With The Colourful Leg, follows Bernadette, now 25, as she takes part in a national magazine fashion shoot and competes in the final of Miss Northern Ireland 2021.
The programme also hears in her own words the ways her diagnosis has changed her – for the better – and how she now views her “robot foot” as a piece of art, customising it and regularly changing its colour with the help of a vinyl car wrapping company.
“Before I got cancer, I was really quiet and wasn’t doing too much,” she says. “I didn’t even use social media.
“It took losing my leg to make me realise that I was holding myself back.”
As soon as Bernadette was diagnosed, she decided to tell her story to help other young people who might be in a similar position realise that they are not alone.
She recorded a video showing her reaction to her diagnosis and since then, her positive social media posts and pictures of her colourful prosthetic customisations have gained her a worldwide following.
Now a charity ambassador as well as a model and actress, Bernadette feels part of the “inclusion revolution” and is the first amputee to take part in the annual Miss Northern Ireland competition.
“People with differences or disabilities haven’t been represented enough in the past, but things are changing,” she says.
“I don’t see my prosthetic as a weakness. I see it as a power.”
Our Lives: The Girl With the Colourful Leg
BBC One NI
Wednesday 29 September at 7.30pm
Also available on BBC iPlayer