In July 2018, after a particularly lazy day drinking tinto de verano and discussing our 10 year plan with the wife, the rug was well and truly about to be pulled out from under us.

Our 4 year old daughter was in a fairly annoying mood this particular evening and following a denied request for chocolate, she accidentally head butted my wife in the boob. This resulted in her finding a small lump in her left breast.

“I’m sure it’s just a cyst” the wife said but at mine and her best friends insistence she booked an appointment with our GP a few days later. “I’m pretty sure it’s something called fat necrosis” the GP informed us. The wife was not impressed. “Did she just call me fat?!”

2 weeks later the GP booked a follow up call. If it was fat necrosis it should have healed up and sodded off by then. Nope. The lump was still there and even more painful so an urgent referral was made to the breast clinic.

The morning of the appointment was the first time that I had actually read the letter from the clinic. “Babe, did you know they say to allow 4 hours for this appointment?” Turns out the wife hadn’t read the letter either! “Oh and you can’t wear deoderant”. “Your joking? I’m gonna stink!” She shouted back, clutching the roll on in her hand.

First test at the clinic was a physical examination with the consultant. My wife has no issue with being naked (lucky me), however, I don’t think she realised how much those puppies would be examined over the next few months. The consultant did his thing and said “I think it’s just a cyst but we’ll do some more tests”

In the waiting room we passed the time reading a book called ‘100 most disgusting facts’ (Did you know that there are approximately 250,000 sweat pores on the soles of your feet and they can produce up to a quarter cup of fluid each day?) and planning where we were going to go for lunch once this inconvenience was out the way. Looking back now our complete naivety to the situation was both adorable and stupid! There was a brief moment when the enormity of what we were about to face tried to give us a sign. After having a biopsy taken three times my wife walked back into the waiting room, tears streaming down her face. I’ve since explained to her that walking into a breast clinic waiting room, crying, clutching your boob with one hand whilst simultaneously making slice your throat gestures with the other is not a good look or comforting to the other women. I thought she’d been told devastating news. She was merely trying to communicate that the biopsy hurt. A lot!

After more waiting we were led back in to see the consultant. We probably should have picked up on the change in the room but we hadn’t had breakfast and still had not decided where to go for lunch. “We think it’s cancer”. No build up to it, no shit sandwich, just straight in with a complete punch in the stomach. Cheers Doc. He couldn’t confirm anything without the results from the biopsy but his eyes said it all.

Numb. Disbelief. Ridiculous. This can’t possibly happen to us, it only ever happens to other people. But we go on holiday in 4 weeks time! (That’s a whole other blog post in the making). These were all the thoughts going through our naive little minds. The car journey back home was silent until my wife said it was ok for me to cry if I wanted to. A few tears escaped. Partly because I knew what was in store the next day. A belated day out at Peppa Pig world for our daughters 4th birthday. Talk about timing…