This is what a winning lottery ticket looks like! 'PSA less than 0.03' is the magic bit. You know when you buy a scratch card, and you slowly rub out the number hoping to reveal something big? Well it's the opposite to that when you pick up this letter from the doctors. You are handed an envelope and you go down the corridor to find somewhere quiet to open it. You know that the contents could mean radio therapy and more medication, but if you are lucky, it could be 'PSA less than 0.03'. You expect the worse because it's easier to handle if it happens! When you get 'the best', it's  still a shock and you want to cry and laugh at the same time, which I did this morning!


Now roll on 2012, a year where I am now 60 and can look forward to finishing my 2nd year at University with a three week expedition to the Carpathian Mountains of Romania in May. Support from my lovely Beverley, family and friends has been crucial over this past 2 years, and I can't thank everyone enough.


I found out also today that when you are 60, you automatically receive a testing kit for Bowel Cancer from the NHS. But nothing for Prostate Cancer, which far more people die of every year. I am only here today because I went to my doctor and had a PSA test, because my Father had died of Prostate Cancer 20 years ago. Had I not gone to my doctor I would now be dead or dying. If you are reading this Blog, do not make the mistake of thinking that it will not happen to you, or any man that you know who is over the age of 45. Your Dad, brother, cousin, son, friend, whoever you care about, nag them until they go and have a PSA test. Don't let them be one of the 13,000 men who die every year in this country, just through ignorance, when you could have helped them. They may not have any symptoms, they may not even feel unwell! 


If you need help, then contact me today.