‘You have cancer.’ The consultant spoke with disturbing clarity.
It was my first year of retirement. Victor and I had spent the previous thirteen months planning a trip to Sikkim.
New eras do not always go according to plan.
It had all started so innocuously. I noticed one or two unusual-coloured faeces and a little weight loss but had slipped comfortably into a ‘monitor the situation’ mindset. It was easy to do. There was an expedition to organise, I had been doing more exercise than previously, my fell-racing results and rock climbing standards were improving and I felt fitter and healthier than for some time.
It was Nicki who persuaded me to go to the doctor. I had just been about a minor issue and hadn’t even bothered to mention any other problem. I am embarrassed to admit that one reason I was reluctant was because I knew that I might be referred for tests that could continue for some time and disrupt the expedition. And I was looking forward to the trip so much. There probably wasn’t anything seriously wrong, and anyway surely a few weeks wouldn’t make any difference? Things would be clearer by the time we got back. It is always possible to dream up reasons for putting things off.
I was almost apologetic for taking up the doctor’s time.
‘I’ve not noticed anything unusual for a couple of weeks now,’ I assured him.
He was unimpressed. A colonoscopy followed.
‘How long will these tests take?’ I asked.
Time was ticking by to our departure date and my fears were coming true. In truth, it was quick. The NHS moves fast when it needs to. And the journey was amazing. Watching a crystal-clear twenty-time-magnification exploration of my large intestine, right up to the inside of my appendix, was eye-opening. The nice lady operating the camera was very chatty.
‘I’ve done over 10,000 of these. This is a lovely healthy intestine.’
And then when the camera was right at the anal sphincter she stopped.
‘There’s your problem,’ she announced.
I peered at the screen. It meant nothing to me but the bleeding greyish polyp, magnified twenty times, didn’t look good. Before the procedure started she had told me that any polyps would be removed. Now that she had found one she called for a second opinion. A lady who had done 10,000 of these was calling for a second opinion. That didn’t feel like a positive step. It was decided that a biopsy should be done. Results would take a few days I was told.
Shit! This was starting to look serious. We were due to leave in just over two weeks. Should I warn Victor and everyone else involved in the trip? I decided not to. What’s the point of spreading uncertainty when there are no answers?
By the time Nicki and I met the consultant for the results I feared the worst but still hoped that Victor and I could somehow still go to the Himalaya.
‘You have cancer.’
It was both a shock and, in a strange way, a relief. The uncertainty was over. No more dithering. The trip would have to be cancelled. I would ring Victor immediately.
He was on the runway about to take off for a guiding trip to Mount Kenya. The connection was not very clear and the conversation halting.
‘Vic, technical problem. I’ve just been told I have cancer so there’s no way I can go.’
‘No worries. We can do some climbing in the Alps instead.’
‘No. No. You are not understanding. The treatment might be pretty hardcore.’
‘Oh …’
I had absolutely no idea what to expect. Cancer to me equated to illlooking people with no hair connected to drips. But people kept telling me I looked well even though the doctors were telling me I was ill.
MRI and CT scans led to the discovery that the cancer had spread from my anus to my lymph nodes.
‘You need a course of chemotherapy and radiotherapy,’ explained the consultant.
This was not sounding good. It appeared that I was destined for some nasty times with no guarantee of a successful outcome. Driving back from the hospital I daydreamed about changing my will to leave bottles of whisky for the last ten finishers in the Jura fell race. It’s funny the way the mind works in such situations. Perhaps I have an underlying jealousy of those good enough to win bottles of whisky under the current arrangements.
The staff at Weston Park Hospital in Sheffield were wonderful. I can’t say they made it enjoyable to endure two weeks of chemotherapy and six weeks of radiotherapy rays being fired at my anus and lymph nodes, but they certainly made it bearable.
Each radiotherapy session started with dropping my trousers in front of two or three young radiographers. Usually it was the same young ladies and it took some time to feel comfortable doing this.
‘Good morning …’ Trousers down, top up and lie back on the radiotherapy table.
Although it became a regular routine it never quite felt a normal sort of thing to do. I couldn’t help thinking it was the kind of behaviour that would lead to prosecution anywhere else.
Thereafter radiotherapy involved the machinery being lined up with the help of three pin-prick tattoos and lying completely still for fifteen minutes while huge lenses rotated, firing rays at me and doing their business. On one occasion I sensed a terrible internal feeling as if the rays had burned a hole in my bladder. Mostly though it was just like having a serious dose of sunburn up the bottom every day without enough time to recover from the previous day.
I was told there was roughly a two-in-three chance that the treatment would be successful but the consultant knew of my annual Himalayan holidays.
‘Your body is used to being under strain for a month or so every year. It will just be a different kind of strain this year,’ she explained.
Rightly or wrongly her words gave me hope.
‘About nine months to recover as much as you are going to,’ I was told. As it happens that was just about exactly the time to the planned Sikkim trip, which Vic and I had simply delayed by a year.
Chemotherapy did seem to drain the body of energy so, uncharacteristically, I felt I should be a little more gradual and structured than usual with my fitness preparation. The doctor had told me I should ‘listen to my body’ and start gradually.
I thought that a little gentle dog walking would be a good start and Jug Hole Wood near Matlock seemed a suitable spot. But, after not very long, a problem had arisen. Our twelve-and-a-half-year-old Labrador had disappeared. Seconds before she had been snuffling about in the depths of the huge entrance to Jug Hole caves. Now she was no longer to be seen. The seven-metre vertical shaft leading into the lower series was the only possibility I could think of.
The caving guide recommended a rope. Without one and with no light other than my mobile phone, the climb down was tricky and not helped by the warmer air in the cave steaming up my glasses.
The shaft led to a low horizontal tunnel where a pair of eyes glinted in the dark. Remarkably, a vertical fall of seven metres had resulted in a terrified dog but no obvious damage. The problem now was how to get a dog, which the vet subsequently weighed at 29.2 kilograms, back to the surface. Phoning home for a rope seemed a good idea but there was no signal. I could climb out and phone but then the dog might wander off into the cave system and fall again. I reviewed the possibility of climbing out. Perhaps if I was able to keep her on my shoulders I could use my body to fill the shaft below her and just kind of push her up and eventually over the final capstone. It was worth a try.
Twenty-nine-point-two kilograms is quite a weight to back-and-foot with, especially when the 29.2-kilogram package in question keeps struggling violently. The smart down jacket I was wearing for my gentle dog walk pushed hard against the mud and rock walls and my walking-boot-clad feet smeared awkwardly. The phone held between my teeth dimly illuminated the scene. It all felt rather precarious. Perhaps sensing this, the dog shat all over me. At least it was reassuring to recall that before telling me to ‘listen to my body’ the consultant had told me my immune system, weakened by chemotherapy, should be more or less back to normal now.
Initially the walls were fairly close together and I could brace myself quite well. Soon though the shaft began to widen and it was necessary to ram the dog’s top quarters into depressions in the sidewall to take some of the weight while I udged up. The wider back-and-foot position and lack of good footholds made things far more strenuous and increasingly less secure than before. The wider shaft also increased the possibility of the dog falling past me. The exertions necessary to push the panic-stricken animal over the final overhang were of Himalayan proportions and left me gasping uncontrollably. I was absolutely knackered. It was by far the heaviest breathing I had done since my treatment started.
With a phone signal now, I phoned Nicki.
‘The dog seems tired today. Could you pick us up please?’
The detail could wait until later. In the meantime I waited at the roadside in glorious winter sunshine assuring concerned passers-by that my bedraggled, mud-and-shit-covered appearance was not a problem and I was not in need of assistance.
Remarkably the dog suffered nothing more than severe bruising and I was left to contemplate that gentle dog walking had been a memorably frightening start to regaining my Himalayan fitness. If the timing had been different I could have recounted it in response to that ‘what is your most frightening experience?’ question.
So how do I feel now? Well, I feel fit, healthy and ready for Sikkim in two and a half months’ time. And I am very aware of what a horrible disease cancer is. It creeps up on you quietly, showing no symptoms until it might be too late.
And creep up it does. As we go to print, after two clear scans, the latest monitoring visit has revealed that I am not in the clear. Much as I feel fighting fit, cancer is back. An operation is likely. Uncertainty prevails.
But at least I have answered the Telegraph’s request for assistance with my obituary.
And the dream of Sikkim is far from dead. Anything is possible.