David first noticed that something was not right when he started having trouble swallowing which was shortly followed by pain below his ribcage. Initially, however, he didn’t see the urgency of visiting his GP – “Being a man in this day and age, I didn’t go to the doctors for a few weeks and still had an uncomfortable feeling in my stomach”

David’s GP referred him for an emergency endoscopy, having assumed that he had a bleeding ulcer but following tests he was diagnosed with Stage 4 Oesophageal Cancer.

“Being diagnosed was hard. The first thing I thought of was my family. I was diagnosed in 2020 at age 32 with a 2-year-old son.”

Following 12 rounds of FLOT chemotherapy, David’s tumour had reduced by more than half its size and he was taken off treatment to allow his body to heal and recover.

“Thankfully side effects didn’t get too bad with treatment. I had tiredness and hair loss, weight loss at the start, but I had a good strong family team around me to provide everything that I needed to keep me strong. The other main side effect which I still have after being off treatment for a while is neuropathy. That was hard at the start, but thankfully has reduced and has become normality at this stage”