Friday 12 April 2024
Maggie's, Royal Marsden
Alex was 33 years old and working as an Army Officer when he was diagnosed with stage 4 testicular cancer. He talks about how Maggie's supports his family and what running the London Marathon means to him.
“It is easier to go through something yourself rather than see someone you love going through the same thing. But that's where Maggie’s comes in.”
I was delivering an army training course in Nepal in the autumn of 2022, leading a trek through the mountains. The month prior, my leg had started to hurt, but I assumed it was just a tear in the muscle and rested it for a few weeks. But as soon as we started the ascent, my leg started to really struggle. We were so remote that I couldn’t stay put or turn back; I had to keep going.
Once back in the UK I saw a physio who referred me to the GP, concerned I may have had a blood clot. Within a day I was sent to A&E for blood tests and scans. They couldn’t find anything.
A couple of days before Christmas, I started to get significant back pain. Things got progressively worse in January – I would be sick all over the table in the middle of work meetings. Twice my boss found me passed out in a corridor. I would cry myself to sleep because of the pain.
I eventually met with a sports medicine doctor, and when she scanned my stomach, I saw a huge, black thing on the screen. The doctor referred me for MRI and CT scans straight away.
It was five in the morning and I was sitting in a chair in A&E with my work laptop in my bag when it was confirmed they had found a large mass. The back pain I had came from my kidney being unable to drain into my bladder because of a tumour clamped around my ureter. They couldn’t completely remove the tumour because it was wrapped around an artery inside my pelvis, but I was in danger of losing my kidney if they didn’t operate straight away.
I thought I would be leaving hospital after a few hours and ended up being there for 28 days. My work friends came to visit me every day. I’m not a crier, but I was crying three or four times a day from the pain.
I was away with work at a shooting range in March 2023 when the hospital phoned me. They said I had testicular cancer that had manifested as a tumour in my pelvis and lungs. It was very aggressive and quite far gone.
I tried to ask as many questions as I could before I told my parents. Would I need to have my testicle(s) removed? Did this mean I also had lung cancer? Did I need to make a will? Thankfully, I had a follow-up call with a clinical nurse specialist, who reassured me that it was completely treatable and that the “Stage IV” I had heard only referred to the extent of the spread.
They reassured me that this was treatable through chemotherapy, but that we would have to start soon, and that the treatment would be quite aggressive to match the cancer. They also sent me for an ultrasound of my testes to check for any tumours, but luckily the scan looked clear, which was a huge relief. I was worried about what this would mean for fertility and began to ask questions – I assumed that any cancer of the testes might impact my ability to have kids.
I went to a sperm bank before starting treatment. I remember being overwhelmed by pages and pages of medical and legal questionnaires. If you were a married man, it was straightforward, but as a single man it was more complicated. There were boxes asking if I wanted the sample destroyed if I got a divorced, did I want it going to my next of kin? What did I want to happen to it if I died?
I was having to think about what I would want to happen if I met someone during this and cancer had made me infertile. I also had to think about dating – do I bring this up or not? There were so many questions and it felt really overwhelming.
Work was brilliant about my diagnosis – I didn’t lose any pay at all. I’m in the military and, at the time, was in a difficult job; I could be whisked away for extended periods of time with no notice. But I felt really looked after by my work.
There was no expectation for me to come back to work, no expectation of having to use my leave for treatment. They told me my job now was getting better.
My boss was a General in the Army. He knew how upset I was about the effect having cancer would have on my career. He wrote a handwritten card to my parents reassuring them I would not be forgotten, and gave them the names of two senior Generals who agreed to look after my career in the military.
The same General asked me if I wanted everyone at work to know. I wanted them to know, but I was nervous about how people would be told. I'd seen how a cancer diagnosis can deeply affect someone, so I didn’t want that to happen to one of my colleagues in public.
There were two guys who worked with me in our training team who had been in the Army for years. They have been to war zones and are hardened soldiers, and when I told them, they completely broke down. One just dropped to his knees and the other couldn’t speak and just kept squeezing my shoulder.
Before cancer, I had been so utterly career focused. I had sacrificed my personal life. When you are moving counties or countries every two years, it is difficult to maintain friendships and relationships. But I missed out on a lot in my career because of cancer. I understood why I couldn’t continue to work, but it was hard being on the sidelines, as well as seeing my team struggle without me.
Having cancer has given me such a perspective shift. I always thought by my mid-thirties I would have settled down, married, possibly have kids. This made me realise that I have to take responsibility and make those things happen rather than wait for them to happen to me.
When I finished treatment, work had lined me up for a job where I’d be in charge of 180 soldiers and deployed overseas. I decided to say no – it was too risky when I didn’t know then how successful treatment might be, and the thought of relapsing and having to abandon those I was supposed to be looking after scared me.
Also, my new perspective meant I wanted some stability now in my life. I still wanted to work hard and towards something I feel is important, but I didn’t want the responsibility of looking after others until I knew I could fully commit to it again. I now work in London, still within the military, but I have a desk job. It means I can make plans, see friends, and see my family. Life is now more than just a job to me. I’m putting my time into meeting new people and prioritising my relationships.
Since I first went into hospital I've been overwhelmed by the support of friends and family. I created a WhatsApp broadcast list with over 100 people after receiving my diagnosis. Sometimes I would get frustrated when people asked questions that had been explained in the text, and I also felt guilty that I didn’t have the energy to respond to everyone individually to address each of their concerns.
My brother and his wife said I should finally embrace social media. I had been avoiding Instagram for years and we decided it would be a way of creating an archive, something to look back on and to help other young men or other soldiers in a similar situation to me by letting them know the support that’s available to them.
Because of the testicular cancer diagnosis and being in the Army, my brother suggested the name Captain Ballbag! I wasn’t a fan, but eventually settled on @majorballache.
I was most nervous about telling my grandmother that I had cancer. My concern was that the shock would put her in a hospital bed right next to me! So, we kept it quiet for a few weeks.
My mum has traditionally been the strong, stoic of the family, but even she couldn’t face telling her. In the end, my two aunties did it, and a few minutes later my mum and I went across to see her and show her that I was physically OK. (I made sure to leave my walking stick at home.) She was visibly upset and had been crying, but within minutes she was at the stove, whipping up all my favourite dishes – this is how she had always expressed her love for me.
If nothing else, knowing about the diagnosis meant she felt she could be involved and do her part. If we’d waited until after treatment as I had wanted to, I think she would have always felt angry or guilty about not having been there for me.
It is easier to go through something yourself rather than see someone you love going through the same thing. And that’s where support for families and friends of people with cancer isn’t obvious. There isn’t support for your support network.
But that is where Maggie’s comes in. My parents would come with me to my appointments, but I would never let them in the consultation room with me. I didn’t think I would be able to process what the doctors were saying if I was worrying about how they were taking the news.
My parents would feel helpless at points watching me struggle through treatment and with injections, so I suggested they go to Maggie’s to wait. It meant they could come and speak to experts from a human side rather than the clinical, who could put everything into perspective. I think it’s helpful to get out of that hospital environment.
Whenever I had friends visit me at hospital, I would always try to bring them to Maggie’s. I felt like I could show off – I felt proud that this is where I was coming when I went to the hospital. We had a beautiful space to sit down and have a coffee and look at the garden.
Running the London Marathon was always on my hypothetical bucket list. I live in Blackheath, right next to the start line. Last year, my best mate Chris was running the London Marathon, and I was three weeks into chemotherapy. I wanted to go and support him, even though I was using a walking stick and on a lot of pain medication, because I knew (with my immune system being eroded so quickly) this might be my last chance to be outside and see friends for a long time.
I thought to myself “I will be back here in a year’s time, running the race myself post-treatment, and that will be my story”.
I am a lot slower now than when I used to run in my army training – I’ve lost a lot of my lung capacity and the largest tumour in my pelvis never completely went away so it still affects the blood flow into my leg, which makes running incredibly painful. Also, the neuropathy and damaged blood flow takes a real toll on my hands and feet.
I have to remind myself that I don’t have the same body anymore. I have new limits. I know I’ll never break world records, but I can still celebrate the small wins. I get better day by day. I have not fully closed the chapter on cancer, but running the London Marathon has helped open a new chapter.
Our cancer support specialists, psychologists and benefits advisors are here for everyone with cancer, and all the people who love them.
Come and see us at your nearest Maggie’s, call us on 0300 123 180 or email us at enquiries@maggies.org
Last review: Apr 2024 | Next review: Apr 2025
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