Life After Cancer

- Fiona Thomas

I sat with my grandad—Papa Frank to us—as he nervously waited for the routine checkup that he dutifully attended every six months, an NHS requirement since he’d been given the all clear following two years of treatment for nonHodgkin lymphoma.

Always the clown, he cracked jokes with the nurses who passed by and gave a familiar wave to the doctors who all knew him by name. They all remembered him clearly because of his sarcastic comments and quick one-liners, a quality which he’s still famous for even though it regularly gets him in hot water with his long-suffering wife. Even though his attitude seemed light-hearted to others, I could tell that the pain of dealing with cancer at the age of 80 had taken its toll, and this was simply his way of coping with a stressful situation. I held my breath as he was taken into the examination room and didn’t fully relax until we both left the hospital with another thumbs up from the specialist.