It’s not easy being told you only have a year to live. I gasped and the room seemed to shrink around me. I was in the Mater Hospital. I recall the details vividly, despite it being ten years ago.
The surgeon said he’d do his best for me, but this was my second metatastic recurrence. The cancer had come back aggressively and invaded my liver and bowel. He would remove a third of my liver. However, in six months time he said it would be full of metastases. My lungs too. He didn’t need to tell me what would come next. I knew. My younger brother had died of advanced cancer just a couple of years previously.
He had a slot in theatre in three days time. Did I want to take it? I jumped at the chance.
The surgeon wasn’t being alarmist. He was being straight with me. This was 2016. At Stage 4, when the cancer had spread to other parts of the body, most patients died. The death rate was different for different types of cancer. For mine it was 90%.
So why have I survived when so many didn’t?
A big question. Without a straightforward answer.
The surgeon was skilled and removed all of the metatastic tumour. Unlike the surgeons at the City Hospital who had failed to do so at the end of 2015, but did permanently damage my abdomen.
The liver and bowel are not the worst places to have a cancer recurrence. The liver is the only organ that can regenerate: mine was healthy and did. The small bowel is 20 feet long, so you can afford to lose a foot of it.
I’ve since had frequent CT scans to check for any signs of recurrence. I am still having them annually at the Cancer Centre. The renal team there have been brilliant. I’m very glad that they took over my care from the renal department at the City, who were neglectful and often incompetent. My first metatastic tumour was found by chance, after I complained about a pain in my side when breathing deeply. My renal consultant had failed to send me for regular surveillance scans.
I’m healthy and fit. I gave up smoking forty years ago and gave up alcohol in 2011 after finding I had renal cancer. I eat well. I’d like to think my immune system is in good shape.
I’m in a loving relationship. T has been by my side throughout the ordeal. Steadfast and utterly dependable. I do wonder how I would have fared without her. But thankfully I haven’t had to find out.
Yet I know many people who had good surgeons and effective treatment, who were heathy and fit, and who were in loving relationships – but despite this, they still died of cancer. My younger brother, for example. So there has to be another crucial factor.
Luck.
I’m very grateful for the unexpected ten years of life I’ve had. I try my best to be healthy and live well. I try my best to do no harm. I hope to have many more years to come. But you never can tell. The type of cancer I had has been known to recur 20 years after the initial tumour. So I won’t start counting my chickens before 2031.
