The Great British Bake Off’s Chris Geiger has written an incredibly moving account of his battle with cancer that ‘should have killed within three months’.
In a letter to his tumour, Bake Off’s latest eliminated contestant describes how he was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin lymphoma at just 24 years old after doctors dismissed his breathlessness and weight loss as stress for eight months.
After suffering fluid-filled lungs, hair loss, vomiting and endless rounds of radio- and chemotherapy, Chris finally defeated his tumour 20 months after his diagnosis.
Rather than be overjoyed, months of suffering took their toll on Chris’ mental and physical health, but has given him a vest for life as he says he now appreciates every precious moment.
In a final message to his cancer, Chris wrote in the book The Cancer Survivors Club: ‘Dear Tumour, why did you pick on me? If you had one ounce of humanity or intelligence, you’d recognize it’s just a matter of time before you’ll be wiped off this planet and extinct forever. I hope you rot in hell.’
Great British Bake Off’s Chris Geiger has written a moving account of his battle with cancer
Given three months to live at 24
At just 24 years old, Chris had completed a marathon and went weight training several times a week when he started inexplicably loosing body fat, struggling to breathe and being unable to exercise without being left exhausted for days.
After eight months of being told he was merely asthmatic or stressed, an operation to get the bottom of Chris’ symptoms revealed he had a tumor lodged between his heart and lungs.
Chris was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin lymphoma and given just three months to live.
Addressing his tumour, Chris wrote: ‘Initially, I was actually pleased they’d found you, having felt so unwell for so long.’
Hospital became a ‘second home’ for Chris for nearly two years.
He describes the nights as the worst as he lay alone in his hospital bed reading about all the gruelling treatments he would shortly have to endure.
Chris wrote: ‘In my mind, I imagined you as a lump of melting snow – black ugly slush that’s found at the side of the road. My consultant said it looked like I’d swallowed a dinner plate.
‘Friends, teachers and ex-girlfriends all poured into my hospital room. I’d not seen some of them for years.
‘They all acted as if I’d already lost the battle and every extra day I lived was a bonus.
‘I couldn’t understand it; instinctively, I knew I was going to kick your arse.’
Bake Off’s latest eliminated contestant describes how he was diagnosed at just 24 years old
‘You and I continued sparring like heavyweight boxers’
After starting with a 10-day course of exhausting radiotherapy, Chris was told it had done little to shrink his tumour.
As the cancer was positioned around his heart and lungs, surgeons were unable to physically remove the mass.
The tumour squeezed one of Chris’ lungs to the extent it would eventually collapse and fill with fluid.
It also crushed the nerves that controlled his vocal cords, meaning he would one day lose his voice.
Surgeons managed to remove one of Chris’ lungs and drain it of fluid. However, in the process, one of the main nerves that controls his diaphragm was accidentally cut, resulting in him having laboured breathing ever since.
He wrote: ‘A small price to pay. I shrug them off as nothing more than war wounds from the battles you and I continued to fight.’
Chris then underwent three rounds of chemotherapy, which caused hair loss, sickness and fatigue, as well as requiring he continually went to hospital to receive blood transfusions.
The final round involved putting Chris to sleep for a week.
He wrote: ‘Oh, what dreams I was having, thinking of you finally being kicked out of my body!’
As his treatment continued to be unsuccessful, Chris had numerous more drugs and blood transfusions in an attempt to beat the stubborn tumour.
He wrote: ‘You and I continued sparring like heavyweight boxers, both of us putting up a courageous battle.’
Doctors dismissed his breathlessness and weight loss symptoms as stress for eight months
‘I had moments where I hid under my duvet and cried’
After the cancer eventually left Chris’ bone marrow, he convinced his doctors a transplant would defeat the tumour once and for all.
They agreed, but on the condition he endure yet another round of chemotherapy to ensure the tumour stayed weak.
He wrote: ‘I knew, if you won this, you’d win the war.’
Although seeing others cancer patients while in hospital die was upsetting, Chris used it as added motivation to defeat his illness.
He wrote: ‘Below my window every morning I watched as a white van arrived, collecting the unfortunate people who had not survived the previous night.
‘The sight of these makeshift coffins being removed wasn’t something I should have witnessed, but a sight I purposely watched. I was determined not to end up leaving the hospital this way.’
After 20 months of suffering, Chris was finally in remission, but his physical and mental health had taken a serious battering.
He wrote: ‘Sadly, I can never forget our duel; but I do hope you regretted picking on me.
‘I had moments where I hid under my duvet and cried. In hindsight, perhaps they were tears of joy or relief; who knows?’
Despite being 20 years ago, Chris says his battle with cancer has eliminated his ‘lazy gene’ as he refuses to do things by halves or waste any of life’s precious moments.
In a final message to his cancer, Chris wrote: ‘If you had one ounce of humanity or intelligence, you’d recognize it’s just a matter of time before you’ll be wiped off this planet and extinct forever.
‘I hope you rot in hell.’
Chris’ story is taken from the book The Cancer Survivors Club.