Legally Blonde – The Musical lead Michelle Brasier has the same cancer gene that killed her brother and father in their 40s.

“I was told by a doctor that I had around a 97 per cent chance of developing bowel, stomach, pancreatic, or ovarian cancer,” Ms Brasier said. 

“I asked (one doctor) what I could do and he said, ‘just catch it,’.”

Yet despite a grim “catch and kill” reality, the former Kooringal High student said she remained positive and hopeful.

“I always see the best in everything,” she said.

“I don't get bothered by small things much.”

Ms Brasier said her family didn’t realise their father’s death was the “canary in a coalmine”, when he was lowered into the ground eight years ago. 

Six years later, she was saying goodbye to her brother, following a year-long battle with stage-four bowel cancer. 

Even though genetic counsellors and doctors have advised she avoid animal proteins, processed foods, smoking, stress, and alcohol, Ms Brasier said no one knew if it would help at all. 

In a moving online article, she said the potential for an aggressive cancer diagnosis was scary but “everyone had to die someday”. 

At 28 years old, Ms Brasier said she had the benefit of knowing what could be around the corner.

“It’s like being handed a licence to use time well,” she said. “I might not have a lot of it.”

Now a stand-up comedian based in Melbourne, she said life was too short to take seriously and too short to waste, which was why she looked for the funny and the hilarious in the devastating.

“I think it’s important not to censor when we’re speaking about death and cancer,” she said. 

“We have to laugh at the little things to make the most of the sad things.”

Ms Brasier said jokes about her father’s death may appear to be in bad taste, but she refused to let death take control of her future. 

“There’s beauty in grief,” she said. “There’s beauty in everything.”

She said she got up on stage to sing songs and tell stories like her own and laugh at them. 

“You have to laugh,” she said. “It’s funny because it has to be.”

Ms Brasier urged readers to make the most of life “or don't” because it was theirs to choose. 

“I’m kind, I’m brave and I’m terrified,” Ms Brasier said. “But I am very easygoing and insufferably positive. It’s just life.”

Ms Brasier said she would be returning home to Wagga to perform her show Double Denim at the Wagga Comedy Festival this year.