There was a sense of nervousness and overwhelming guilt as I picked up the phone. I was going to make a phone call I had never wanted to make, and I had never expected to have to make it. When my mum picked up the phone, I explained that I could not meet her and my dad at 7pm as planned. That time was four hours away, but I just knew that my stomach wasn’t feeling well enough to make the journey from my home in South London to our meeting point in North London.
And even if I could make the journey up to a theatre in Hampstead, I didn’t have any confidence that I’d be able to sit and watch the play without needing the toilet many times. Obviously, after I left the auditorium for the first time, I wouldn’t be allowed back in again, and I believe that’s fair enough. So I had to make the executive choice to spend the evening near the toilet in my home rather than on the floor of one at a theatre miles away from my town.
That day, I’d been woken up at around 4am with the tell-tale pre-diarrhoea stomach pains and was relieved to be able to go back to bed by 7am. And the fun didn’t stop when I woke again at around noon.
But this didn’t mean that I didn’t feel guilty when I phoned my parents to say I couldn’t go with them to see the play we had booked months before.
Since being diagnosed with incurable bowel cancer in the summer of 2023, I’ve let a lot of people down.
I’ve cancelled nights out at short notice because I’ve felt too sick or haven’t trusted my stomach and bowels not to play tricks on me. I’ve left pubs early because of diarrhoea and I’ve bailed on comedy nights because of exhaustion.
But this was the first time chemo side effects had led to my having to cancel something with my parents.
And it felt the same as when I was eight years old and my mum and dad read my school report. Back then, I got an A for achievement and a B for effort, while my sister got an A in both categories.
I had thought that a B for effort was good enough if it resulted in an A for achievement, but I could tell my parents didn’t see it that way, and I felt like I’d let them down.
Thirty-eight years on, some might say that having to cancel a night out because of chemotherapy side effects isn’t my fault, as I cannot choose when and where diarrhoea will strike.
But the counterargument to that is that if I had reported many of my symptoms sooner (even the ones that were associated by medics as being linked to my meningitis in the spring of 2023 and other health conditions), then I would not have stage four cancer, so I would not have to undergo such a gruelling chemotherapy regimen.
Guilt like this is a massive side-effect for a lot of cancer patients, but their medical teams seldom acknowledge it. Instead, they work to treat the physical symptoms, which they are trained to do.
Their expertise lies in what cells are doing, rather than what brain cells are thinking, but they should still realise they can help their patients with their mental health. They can do this by seeing how their patients are and referring them elsewhere for support if necessary – whether that be a support group, a befriending service, or a psychologist who has undergone specialist training about cancer.
This is not just something they can do. It is something they must do. And this is why I’m leading the Daily Express’s Cancer Care campaign: to ensure that all cancer patients have access to mental health support both during and after their treatment.