In 2022, Steve was working as a prison guard when he began noticing symptoms. He was losing weight, and he didn’t know why. Then the pain started.
“I had severe pains in my legs, between my knee and hip… I called an ambulance and got to the hospital. They gave me fentanyl or morphine or something, then sent me home.”
“The third time it happened, I said to the doctor, ‘I can tolerate pain. But I can’t tolerate this.’ Two days later, I was diagnosed with cancer. It was the 25th of July, 2022.”
The day Steve was diagnosed with Stage 4 Burkitt lymphoma is etched in his memory. “The first thing I asked was, ‘Is it treatable?’ and they said that Burkitt lymphoma is aggressive, but it is treatable. I cried, because my wife had passed away from myeloma, and it brought back all those memories.”
This was the beginning of Steve’s six-month hospital stay, where he received four days of chemotherapy each month, alongside other treatments.
“I don’t remember the first month well, because I was hallucinating with all the drugs. At one stage, I had a caregiver sitting on my bed 24/7 just to stop me doing anything stupid. I didn’t know what country I was in.”
Steve also struggled with severe weight loss. “I used to be 86 kilos, and at the peak of the cancer, I got down to 52 kilos. I was too scared to take my shirt off because I could count every rib.”
As he neared the end of his first month in hospital, Steve decided he needed to take some control back. “I kept in the back of my head, ‘The hospital’s doing the medical stuff – I’ve got to do the physical.’”
“Because I was in bed the whole time, I was wasting away. So I staggered out of bed and made my way to the patient lounge. There was an exercycle down there. I used to do it once or twice a day, just slowly, for five minutes.”
Steve found it difficult to accept support while he was in hospital. But one person he did allow to help him was Nicki, a Support Services Coordinator from LBC. “She used to come through the hospital every week or two, and she’d come and have a chat. That was probably more beneficial than the drugs, just having a chat to someone who talks to you with empathy.”
Steve was also grateful for the financial support he received from LBC while he was in hospital. “LBC made sure I didn’t have to pay for my hired TV, which was marvellous.”
Steve now lives on his house bus, and after more than 50 years of employment, his diagnosis has forced him to give up work for good. “It’s an awesome job, retirement, but the pay sucks!”
Despite some remaining side effects of treatment, Steve is enjoying life and making the most of the time he gets to spend with his family. “Every morning, I wake up and say to myself, ‘You’re alive.’ I’ve got a picture of my wife in the bus, and I look at her and say, ‘I’m alive.’”