This is My Story
Wednesday 17th Jun
The world didn’t stop spinning when the doctor said the words, but it certainly slowed down to. It was 2024 when I was diagnosed, and the numbers that followed sounded like a bad performance review. A Gleason score of 9. High-grade. Aggressive.
Suddenly, my calendar wasn’t filled with work meetings or weekend plans; it was measured in 40 sessions of radiation therapy.
If you’ve never had radiation, it’s a strange mental game.
You walk into a room dominated by a massive, sci-fi-looking machine, lie perfectly still, and let invisible beams do their work. The ups and downs during those 40 sessions were a rollercoaster.
Some days I felt like a warrior, driving to the clinic with upbeat music blasting, ready to conquer the world. Other days, the cumulative fatigue hit me like a physical wall, and just lifting my feet to get into the car felt like running a marathon.
But we made it through. Just as I was ready to celebrate crossing that finish line, it was time for phase two: hormone therapy.
Medical castration is a heavy concept, and the side effects wasted no time making themselves known. My testosterone plummeted to near-zero, and suddenly, my body belonged to a stranger.
I became intimately acquainted with hot flashes—sudden, intense waves of heat that made me want to rip my shirt off in the middle of the grocery store.
Then came the emotional shift. I’ve always been a pretty stoic guy, but hormone therapy turned my tear ducts into a leaky faucet.
The peak of this absolute absurdity happened a few months into the treatment. My partner, trying to lift my spirits and get me out of the house, suggested a movie date. We ended up at a cheesy, predictable chick flick.
A year ago, I would have been checking my watch or quietly snoring. But there I was, sitting in the dark theatre next to my partner, clutching a tub of popcorn. About halfway through the film, the star-crossed lovers had a minor, highly manufactured misunderstanding.
A single tear rolled down my cheek. Then another. Within five minutes, I was full-on sobbing.
I’m talking shoulders shaking, chest heaving, desperately trying to muffle my gasps into a handful of napkins.
My partner looked over, eyes wide in absolute shock, before a massive grin broke across her face. She took my hand, leaning over to whisper, "Are you going to be okay, tough guy?"
Through my blubbering, I managed to choke out, "They just... they just belong together!"
We both burst out laughing, right there in the quiet theater, my tears mixing with genuine, belly-deep laughter.
That’s the thing about this journey. Cancer takes a lot from you—your energy, your privacy, your hormones. But if you look closely enough between the scans and the side effects, it also gives you these bizarre, beautiful, and hilarious moments of pure humanity. I’m still fighting, but as long as I can find the funny side of crying over a romantic comedy, I know I’m going to be just fine.
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