Laura Liddle was diagnosed with vulval cancer in July last year and now she is spreading the message of what to look for
A woman is urging others to “know their normal” after she discovered the intense pain and itch was cancer. Laura Liddle, 31, was diagnosed with vulval cancer in July 2025 after spending months suffering with uncontrollable pain, itchiness and swelling.
Despite numerous trips to her GP over three months where she was tested for thrush and STIs, which all came back clear, she was left in agony. After being referred to a hospital gynaecology department, a biopsy revealed Laura had pre-cancerous VIN 3 (Vulval Intraepithelial Neoplasia).
The hospitality worker underwent surgery to have part of her labia removed in July 2025 and later that month received the devastating news it had developed into vulval cancer. Laura then underwent another surgery to remove the lymph nodes in her groin in December 2025.
Now healing at home after being declared cancer-free, Laura is bravely sharing her story to encourage women to regularly check themselves and get anything unusual looked at. Laura, from Bristol, said: “A lot of young girls don’t touch their vaginas, they don’t look at their vaginas, it’s a taboo thing to do.
“You have to know what it feels like, you have to know what is down there for you to know if something’s not right. I think it [vulval cancer symptoms] really needs to be talked about and be advertised everywhere.”
Laura was first alerted there may be an issue with her vulva in March 2022, while recovering from groin abscess surgery. While cleaning the wound, Laura became concerned that part of her vagina ‘didn’t look right’, due to a swelling in her left labia.
As it wasn’t painful, and was simply a little more swollen than the right-hand side, Laura brushed it off as ‘just her anatomy’. Laura said: “I didn’t worry about it at all, I just thought it was my anatomy. No one vagina is the same as the other. None of my partners have ever mentioned it, to me it was just normal, I just put it off as nothing.
“At the beginning of last year I was getting increasingly even more sore, to the point where I couldn’t wear underwear, I couldn’t walk and I couldn’t sleep. I was in proper agony.”
She told how she had suffered with thrush her whole life and said the doctors kept putting it down to that. she added: “Everything they tested me for – thrush, STIs, you name it they were testing me for it down there – all results said I had a clean bill of health.
“It was unbearable pain and I couldn’t get rid of it. They [doctors] gave me local anaesthetic gel to numb it, but even that wasn’t helping.”
After being referred to a hospital gynaecology department in April 2025 a biopsy revealed she had pre-cancerous VIN3, before surgery results revealed it had developed into vulval cancer. Laura said: “[When they told me I had vulval cancer] I was more concerned about how it would affect my family.
“It’s a very rare cancer and it normally shows up in women over 70. I’m only 31, they’re saying it’s probably down to my immune system and that HPV could be a factor.
“I do think about it and it does get me down. I’m only 31, I shouldn’t be having this happen to me. I like to work, I like to be busy and the fact I can’t do anything is driving me insane. Going to the toilet is very painful, it burns, and they’ve said it will affect my sex life.”
Laura, who was told she was cancer-free on December 24, is now sharing her experience to encourage people to regularly check themselves. She said: “I’ve posted it everywhere I could. I’ve been speaking to everybody, everyone down my local shop, any women I speak to [about it]
“Even men I’m like ‘listen, check your missus out’. Even my little nieces I’ve said to them ‘look I know this is something you don’t really want to discuss but you need to’.
“I think they should be testing you for that when you go for your smear, just checking it looks ok and if it doesn’t, getting a biopsy from the area.”
What is vulval cancer?
According to the NHS vulval cancer is cancer that’s found anywhere in the vulva. The vulva is the area around the opening of the vagina, including the inner and outer lips around the vagina (labia) and the clitoris. Vulval cancer may be caused by certain types of human papillomavirus (HPV), or by skin conditions that affect your vulva.
Symptoms of vulval cancer can affect any part of your vulva, but they’re most common on the inner and outer lips (labia) around the opening of your vagina. Symptoms can include: a lump, a sore, bleeding from your vulva, or blood-stained vaginal discharge, that is not related to your periods, itching that does not get better, changes to your skin, such as red, white or dark patches, a mole that changes shape or colour, burning pain when you pee.
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