So today is World Cancer Day. I don’t really know what that means or what it is supposed to achieve but I’m going to use the opportunity to tell you a story. Do try to stay awake!

I’ve done some fundraising for MacMillan since I was diagnosed and I am always honoured and privileged to do so. The most difficult event I’ve ever attempted was a speech to around 120 of my closest friends at our Captain’s Charity Golf Day a couple of years ago.

The charity day was being held as a fundraiser for MacMillan and I (stupidly) volunteered to put a familiar face on the proceedings. The thing is, we all attend charity events and we watch as someone we’ve never met stands up and tells us about the vital the work that the charity does. It’s all good – and important – stuff, but it’s not real. It’s not personal. It’s remote – dissociated from us. I wanted to show my friends what their donations meant in real terms and in a very personal way.

I invested emotionally a little more than I intended during the speech and having completed it, I had to walk out into a private quiet room and bawl my eyes out, but I felt it was important that those people who had given up their time – and money – were given some understanding of how it was making a difference in a very real way. The gist of the speech is below – I hope it makes sense.

“As you all know, I have leukaemia. Most people who are diagnosed with some form of cancer have good solid support systems around them – whether that be family, friends, workmates and so on. Some, tragically, do not. I am blessed to have the most magnificent, wonderful and loving circle of family and close friends. But some fight alone, lost in a world of loneliness, anxiety and fear.

Sometimes, even with the best support system in the world, there are things that you just can’t talk to your nearest and dearest about. By definition, these are the people you love most in the whole wide world. You don’t want to worry them, or scare them.

And sometimes, in those dark hours of the night, that’s when your fears speak – no, they scream! – most loudly into your brain. Whether you’re worried about money, worried about treatment, worried about the effect of symptoms and consequences of your type of cancer or a million other night terrors that get visited upon you, these are things you just don’t want to talk to your nearest or dearest about because you don’t want to worry them. You’re worried sick about it so what’s the point in disturbing someone else’s equilibrium by worrying them about it too, right?

But most of all, you’re scared because someone has told you that you might die. You’re scared of the treatment. You’re scared about whether your partner will be ok and whether they’ll have enough money when you’re gone. Death does not scare me. The effects of it on my wife and those around me most certainly do.

And that’s where MacMillan comes in. They’re there with practical help and advice. They’re there to walk you through treatment options. They’re there to advise you on financial concerns. They’re there to put you in touch with counsellors if you haven’t already been given one. They’re there to help you through the worst of the night terrors.

They are just always there.

Always.

So every penny you raise today, every coin you pop into a MacMillan‘s collection box, every donation you make from your salary is making a real and genuine difference, every single day to real people like me. Almost every one of you will be touched by cancer: Today, I am your brother, your mother, your father, your close friend, your workmate. I’m your auntie, your cousin, your neighbour. I am your partner. Today I stand in front of you as every man and every woman who has been diagnosed with cancer.

From the bottom of my heart – and on behalf of every cancer patient in the world, I thank you. The leukaemia may eventually get me, but it will never kill the love and gratitude I have for every one of you today.

What you have done today will save someone’s life. Thank you.

Stay strong. Fight hard. Smile lots.“

And off I went to have a private cry. I lost count of the number of people who came up to me afterwards to say that they’d never felt so personally connected to a charity event. Apparently most had a tear (or fifty) in their eye. We raised thousands of pounds that afternoon/ evening and every penny of that money is making a difference every single day to people like me. So those guys and girls who raised money, together with MacMillan, were my sporting heroes of 2020. That’s worth thinking about on World Cancer Day.

This is an edit of an article was first published in February 2020 in a pre-Covid world. It was World Cancer Day.