Since Chris’ diagnosis, Cancer seems to be everywhere.

Every time I turn on the TV, it’s in films, on the news, on adverts, on the radio, on the back of buses, on my facebook and twitter feeds.

There is no escaping it.

Each time it’s mentioned, each time I hear on the news that a celebrity has passed away from it, each time I hear another survivor story, each time I hear stories with not so happy endings I want to scream until there is no air left in my lungs.

I used to be able to ignore cancer.

How awful does that sound.

I would watch the adverts and hear the stories, I would feel empathy but I didn’t ever give it much more thought.

Cancer.

It was never going to affect me.

I would never have to deal with that.

Of course we’ll be the lucky ones.

We’ll probably know someone with it, statistically we’ll have to.

It won’t be us.

I know people whose loved ones had cancer, I love my friends dearly, I saw how it affected them and my heart broke for them when their loved ones weren’t able to fight anymore.

Really, I didn’t get it at all.

I wondered if it was because cancer was now in our lives that I see it everywhere, that it was the thing I thought of most, noticed more than anything else.

Then I realised, it’s because IT IS everywhere.

Cancer.

Indiscriminately invading healthy bodies and making them sick.

It doesn’t give a shit who you are, where you’re from, what your religion is, whether you’re rich or poor, what your life is like.

It couldn’t care less if you are alone or if you have the love of family and friend around you. If you are old or young, if your kids are small or grown.

It’s a thief. It steals healthy cells and makes them bad.

It steals time, it steals hope, it steals futures, it steals happiness, it steals limbs, it steals lives.

I watch my husband, the greatest man I have ever met, have his body poisoned in the hope that they can cure.

I watch him miss his kids, I watch him not being able to eat and feel sick, I watch him uncontrollably tired, I watch him get weak and ill and he can’t even explain how he is feeling or how I can help because it’s simply unexplainable.

I’m told I’m strong, but really there is no other choice.

I know he is doing this for us, because he loves us.

Because he wants us to grow old and grey together and watch our kids grow up.

So I can only see a future, the end goal.

This is just the beginning for us. I know things are going to get worse, much worse before they can get better.

And if they can cure his cancer, and every fibre of my being believes they can, then we will be one of the lucky ones.

Cancer is everywhere

Fucking up people’s lives one cell at a time.

Today, on world cancer day, don’t just pass it by, like I would have done in the past. Send a message to someone you know fighting, text the wife, mother, brother, cousin, daughter, son, dad, husband, friend, neighbour of that person, let them know they’re not alone.

Open your eyes, your ears, your hearts. Be aware, raise awareness and talk about it.

This is the last thing I ever dreamt of happening but it did.

Be unified and one day they’ll find a cure.

I will be spending the day with Chris at his bedside in Christies, watching him fight.

For us.

Cancer Sucks.