So its the 2nd January I had already been told before Christmas that it was highly likely that it was thraot cancer.

On the 2nd January it was the official meeting and it has taken me a while to write this up as it was a shock…

Firstly I walk into a(frankly tiny) room at the Royal Surrey and there is about 6 people in the room I expected 1 or 2 my consultant and the Oncologist.

Shiock 1 – The cancer

My Consultant who had performed the Pandendoscpy and had the CT scan gave me the resuts in Medical terms it was T4, N2, M0, SCC, P16 positive, left oropharynx.

So luckly I had my wife with me, a tip for anyone undergoing this have a Karen by your side, whilst I was listening and trying to abosorb information which was hard she was taking notes – of course I receive letters afterwards but trust me a notebook is your frien on such visits.

What does this mean

T4 – Its a big old lump or technically “advanced primary tumor the primary tumor is moderately advanced, meaning it has grown beyond the oropharynx into surrounding structures like the larynx, extrinsic muscles of the tongue, medial pterygoid muscle, hard palate, or mandible. ”

N2 – It has crossed to the other side – The cancer has spread to regional lymph nodes, specifically to nodes on the opposite side of the primary cancer or both sides of the neck, and none are larger than 6 cm. 

M0 – its juts the neck – phew – There is no evidence of distant metastasis, meaning the cancer has not spread to other parts of the bod

SCC – Its just common and garden throat Cancer – “This indicates the type of cancer, which is the most common type of oropharyngeal cancer”

P16 – Its HPV realted which is good – This indicates that the cancer cells express the p16 protein, a marker that strongly suggests the cancer is HPV-related

Shock 2

So after this the consultant then explains that I may need pre-induction chemo -so basically more chemo – more on this later it more than doubled the treatment time so this was shock 2 but there was more to come.

Shock 3

Ok Dr lets keep em coming shall we – OK I may need an operation to add a feeding tube as the radiotherapy my affect my abilty to eat. “What” no one told me about this as a man who a) likes his food and b) is a wimp when it comes to medical this was a shock I dont think I took in much more from the session after this to be honest luckily Karen was taking notes.

So after this the nutrionist talks about how to look after mny health and the voice coach talks about excercises to do to ensure I can keep swallowing, and frankly I just want to get out of that room its all becoming too real.