The positive, life-changing experience, I wouldn’t have chosen

Hi all, 

I am Dave from Bristol. In 2015, I was on holiday in Florida on my Birthday and I was in the shower, when I felt a lump in my right breast. Now most men would tend to think, “Oh, it's just a boil, you know, men don't get breast cancer.” But I’d had some fatty tissue removed off my chest a few years beforehand. I made a comment to the surgeon, who told me that men can get breast cancer, so I knew it was possible.

I saw my GP when I got back, who was superb. She just took it at face value and said, “It's probably fatty tissue, but we need to get it checked.” When the breast cancer surgeon did the ultrasound, he clearly wasn’t happy with what he saw. So, I ended up having a biopsy and a week later I was being told that I was one of the 300 to 400 men who get breast cancer each year. There's two ways you can deal with it. You can either feel all doom and gloom, or you can do everything you can to do something about it and stay positive.

My first reaction was to sign up for the Moonwalk, a charity fundraising walk organised by breast cancer charity Walk the Walk. I'd  previously completed the full marathon in 2012, and I thought, you know, I'll do it again, and that'll give me a focus. I signed up in October when it was due to happen the following May. Shortly after my diagnosis, I had the right-side mastectomy as well as having my lymph nodes removed. It later turned out that they didn't need to take out my lymph nodes, but they were playing safe.

I then had six rounds of chemotherapy over 18 weeks. I can only speak of my experience, but I found that the biggest problem with chemotherapy is that one week you're fine. The second week you're fine. Then you hit a brick wall and you go into like a black mist, and you just can't focus. You just can't think. That was the worst part, just being unable to focus for five or six days and then you come out of it the other end.

I finished my chemotherapy in May of 2016. They wanted to do the radiotherapy literally back-to-back, but I asked for six weeks off to do the Moonwalk. Originally, I planned to do the full 26 miles, but I wasn't really that well, so I applied to go onto the 15-mile route. I did it literally a week after my chemo finished. My wife was quite concerned about whether I’d be able to complete it. But being the stubborn individual that I am, I decided that I would.

I had a friend called Eddie, who is a retired special forces guy, and he said he would follow me around and make sure I was doing okay. Every mile, Eddie would pop out of the bushes, all dressed in black, as you would classically expect someone in the special forces to dress. He’d then say, “What day is it? Yes. What's your name? Yes.” And he’d make me answer all these questions then disappear. He was going around the route in the car, so he was never more than a few yards away in case I needed to pull out. My wife’s children and my children all did the 26 mile walk too, so I had lots of support. At the end of the walk although I was exhausted however, I also felt I had given breast cancer a poke in the eye!

In June 2016, I completed my treatment, and I came out the other end. Touch wood, I'm currently cancer free. Now there is absolutely no guarantee that of course it won't come back. And if it comes back, it's likely to be more difficult, so I have the Penny Brohn UK card in my back pocket and would be the first to use it. A lot of what I do now is about raising awareness around two things. Firstly, the fact that men can get breast cancer. Secondly, I'm a crusader in the sense of getting guys to get themselves checked. It is so rewarding to have been a co-moderator of the VMU since it started in 2020. Now I sit on the National Institute of Clinical Excellence breast cancer working group this is  the group that dictates the treatment that should be available to people living with breast cancer across England and Wales. I'm there as the male voice to make sure that, when they consider things, they don't forget the male perspective.

So, for me, breast cancer has been a positive, life-changing experience that I would not choose to have had. That's the best way I could put it. If I was giving somebody one piece of advice it would be to try and find something to focus on to help you go through the journey. In my case, it was the Moonwalk, but there are so many other things you can do. What I had was an aggressive form of breast cancer. But because I responded so quickly, I gave myself the best opportunity to do something about it. The breast cancer surgeon said that, if I'd have waited four to six weeks, it could have been very different.

So my final words are, if something changes in your body, you don’t feel right and it does not improve within a couple of weeks GET IT CHECKED!

Kind Regards,

Dave