So here we are, Terminal Three. Three years since my cancer diagnosis, and it’s been the toughest year by far. Shortly after writing my Terminal Two blog in July 2025 it became clear that the treatment I was undergoing, Lutetium-177, a radioactive isotope delivered intravenously, was failing. My PSA was rising, and the oncologist was concerned. As it happened, I got through the rest of the treatment, which saw me through till the end of October, but within a couple of weeks of it finishing things started to go further awry. The first sign of trouble was a searing pain on the right side of my head which persisted through the usual painkilling meds. At the time I didn’t connect it with the cancer because the pain was in a place that hadn’t previously shown up as a problem in scans. I self-diagnosed the pain as neuropathy which I’d suffered from some years earlier, and for which I was prescribed Amitriptyline. Then, while I was struggling with this pain a new symptom materialised: my tongue started to veer to the left, and my speech became slurred. When I saw the oncologist who’d been overseeing the Lutetium treatment and mentioned this new development, he lined up a scan for me. In the meantime, based on the assumption it could again be neuropathy, I was prescribed Amitriptyline. After three days things had not improved: was still there and my slurred speech had become more pronounced.

Dini was very concerned, and she insisted I phone the Beatson. I was taken through some questions and as a result was told to go straight to QEUH to have tests done. On Friday 21 November I had a CT scan and a few hours later a doctor came and told me I had ‘a little bit of meta behind my ear’. A new tumour in the base of my skull, threatening my brain; it was not neuropathy after all. I was released from hospital the following day with a prescription for Dexamethasone. It seemed remarkable, killing the pain almost immediately, and I was able to talk normally again.  When I saw my regular oncologist the following Tuesday, he confirmed that the cancer had spread. There was a tumour pressing at the base of my skull, located at the twelfth cranial nerve, which controls speech, hence my slurred speech. While my first line of treatment had given me nine months of respite, the Lutetium treatment had afforded me a mere nine days. I was referred to a head and neck cancer specialist and was given targeted radiotherapy to tackle the tumour between the 8th and 12th December. This treatment was delivered via a £2million laser that shaved the tumour to within one-hundredth of a millimetre. During the treatment I wore a face mask that was moulded for me and clamped on tight so that my head was kept perfectly still. On the last day of treatment, Friday 12^th December 2026, I was told I could take the mask home. I joked that it was a bit scary looking and I would have to hide it from the grandkids. One of the radiographers said, ‘The children have theirs painted,’ a sentence that brought home to me how indiscriminate cancer is, striking at any stage of life, and how difficult it must be for NHS staff to be confronted with that reality in their daily lives.

That treatment went well, but unfortunately the steroid that was keeping the wolf of pain from the door was also having a negative effect on my mental health, to the extent it was affecting my relationship with Dini and whoever else I came into contact with. My dose of Dexamethasone had to be speedily reduced. This overlapped with the start of my new course of palliative chemotherapy, Cabazitaxel, which was fast-tracked, starting from 29 December. My oncologist arranged for me to be admitted to the Beatson on 30 December for a psychiatric assessment of the effect of the steroids. I was kept in overnight and on the morning of 31 December I had a psychotic episode and a series of seizures. I was detained under the 2003 Mental Health Scotland act and spent 10 days in the Beatson, not quite understanding what was happening, though I was very well cared for by staff and by visiting family and friends. I was put on antipsychotic and anti-seizure medication which started to take effect within a week.

When I got out of hospital, I realised that the weeks of sleeplessness on the steroids had physically drained me. I was in poor shape, but I continued with the programme of chemotherapy every three weeks, which was scheduled to run until 8 July 2026. By May it became clear that the chemo was not holding back the spread of the disease, and the treatment was discontinued. As far as chemotherapy goes, it’s the end of the line.

I have since been put on a course of Zoledronic Acid, a bisphosphonate, to help strengthen my bones. The first dose was in early June, and infusions are to be given twelve weeks apart. Meanwhile another treatment has been put on the table, Radium 223. This is a radioactive isotope that targets the active areas of cancer in the bones and reduces pain when all other options have failed. The treatment will commence on 14 July 2026, just as I enter my fourth year of cancer.

It’s been a journey, to coin a cliché. I’m just grateful that the journey continues. I’ve had an increasing amount of pain and nausea and am now on two forms of morphine as well as a range of other painkillers. There are good days and bad days, but Maggie’s Cancer Centre and more recently St Margaret’s Hospice have been beacons for me. The Radium 223 treatment will take me through to 1 December, and what happens after that, nobody knows.

One last thing among many things. In the last few weeks I’ve published a book of poetry called Cancer, Ya Dancer! At times I felt it would never see the light of day, but it’s now a physical reality.  I’m hoping it will provide some comfort for others touched by cancer, and some insight into an experience seldom associated with dancing, or poetry for that matter.