Benjamin Evans - Author

Seasons greetings from Chemo Ward B. Big news this week. I’m here to have some chemo! White blood cells are back to normal, I haven’t contracted any major infections and the weird line in my armpit looks in good shape. It’s Friday and I’m ready for a chemo party. This week’s blog is a fashion special. I don’t know about you, but when I’m walking around the house feeling like I need to vomit, I want to look good! So here’s a guide to what’s trending in the world of cancer this winter. In Scarves When not in hospital, cancer patients spend most of their time sitting on park benches or wistfully walking along the beach. Having a good scarf is an essential accompaniment to this. It gives a certain intellectual quality - think Sherlock Holmes with a hangover - and it protects our sensitive throats from the wind. I like a nice long woolly number, it looks good and has chemo-chic written all over it. Jumpers Not since Sarah Lund in The Killing have knitted jumpers been at s...

In the hubbub of life, clarity can be a hard thing to find. Cancer is no different. The body is under attack and to deal with this it forces the mind to think some pretty crazy things. Today I want to relate some of the personal dialogues I've experienced over the last few months and the methods that I’ve drawn upon to keep some semblance of normality. Mad thought: ‘You’re never going to feel better, ever again. This is your life now.’ We all have reactions such as this. I spent pretty much entire late teens thinking that splitting up with a girl was the equivalent of the Cuban Missile Crisis. Even now events like losing a job, getting a running injury or not being able to charge my phone prompt a similar end-of-the-world reaction. The truth, of course, is that life isn’t really that profound. As Take That wisely observed – ‘everything changes,’ and it’s like this with chemotherapy. One day you feel terrible, but the next day you don’t and sometimes there’s no rhyme or r...

1. Wake up. Its 7am and its still dark. Weigh up motivations for getting up or staying in bed. Stay in bed for another hour. 2. Take 800 mg of highly toxic cancer medication 3. Check the TV guide over breakfast. The highlight of the day is University Challenge – which doesn’t start for another twelve hours. What am I going to for the rest of the day? 4. Read a book for ten minutes to try and feel productive. Decide its too early. Watch the new Taylor Swift video on You Tube instead, then make a cup of coffee. 5. Spend the morning arranging old holiday photos on Facebook. I used to be so happy and good looking. What’s happened? 6. Eat some toast, then stab myself in the stomach with an immune boosting injection. Regret eating the toast. 7. Spend an hour looking for Christmas films on Netflix, then turn it off and watch a repeat of How I Met Your Mother on Channel 4. 8. Change into running kit. Jog around the kitchen until it stops raining. It doesn’t stop raining, so ...

Hello from Chemo Ward B! Its Friday, I’m in a room with twelve other cancer patients and there’s a nurse in front of me with a box of syringes. We’re all set for a chemo party. Except they aren’t chemo syringes. Due to an excessively low white blood cell count I’ve been prescribed a new set of drugs to boost my immune system. I’ll need to inject myself every day for the next six months, and take an extra week off to allow my body to fully recover. Chemo is strong stuff folks. Alongside the drugs, the nurses also advise me of a list of foods that will help to improve my white blood cell count. And that’s the subject of this week’s blog. Food that’s good for the immune system and food that’s good for people on chemotherapy. One in two of us will experience cancer in our lifetime, so you don’t want to make any faux pas when it comes to serving up dinner. Good foods Chips and Gravy Pop quiz class. How does Chemotherapy work? Its…kind of like radiation right? It fills you w...

About eight years ago I decided to change my life. I gave up smoking, stopped drinking as much, bought myself a bike and started running. I’d love to tell you that this was due do a profound spiritual revelation, like something out of a Paulo Coelho novel, but the reason was much simpler. I watched a one-hour TV documentary about a guy called Mark Beaumont who cycled around the world and thought ‘ I want to do that .’ Five years later, and after a few false starts, I was cycling across the Sahara on my way to Cape Town. If it wasn’t for Mark Beaumount, this would never have happened. In this week’s blog I want to tell you about the new inspirational figures I’ve found as a recovering cancer patient. Jane Tomlinson In 2000 Jane Tomlinson was given 12 months to live. She’d had breast cancer and after 3 years of chemotherapy and radiotherapy was told that it had spread to her heart and lungs. She could have curled up in ball and cried herself to an early death. Instead she to...

Hello from planet cancer. It’s nearing the end of the second stage chemotherapy and the side effects have started to take their toll. The novelty of having working saliva glands, energy, a stomach lining and fingers that aren’t like popsicles will not go unnoticed at the end. Luckily for us, not a day goes by when people don’t remind cancer patients of our incredible bravery or eulogise us for our capacity to get out of bed in the morning. For those with unfashionable conditions like gout, MS or schizophrenia the reaction is usually polite ignorance or mild disgust – but for cancer patients there is a big hug and a 10k run laid on in our honour. We are lucky. Everyone feels for us. In today’s blog I want to share the empathy that has been offered to me in the last few months. Some it has been really nice and has really helped me through some tough times. And some of it...has been slightly less effective. Good empathy ‘The cancer hasn’t spread. You’ll need chemotherapy to...