EVERY single day I get asked the same question – by lots of different people.

How do you stay so positive when you live with stage 4 cancer?

My Insta inbox is full of messages from people all asking how I do it?

I get asked how do I smile when I don't feel well? How am I so active? How do I laugh through the pain?

How do I have hope when most in the same situation don't.

Here's the thing, I don't.

I'm not always positive, I don't always see the bright side and I definitely do have days where I want to curl up and hide away.

But, I know what happens if I let that side of it all take over.

I know there's a dark path waiting for me, a miserable spiral of woe that's almost impossible to break free from.

I know because I've found myself there, more often than I care to remember.

And then, there's knowing what it feels like to say goodbye to some of your closest friends, all taken too soon by cancer.

Watching my friends face their deaths, is a sobering and inspiring thing, all at the same time.

I have a choice. I can choose to get busy living, or spend my every waking moment panicking about dying.

I have a choice. I can choose to get busy living, or spend my every waking moment panicking about dying

Don't get me wrong. It's hard to choose to focus on living, when your mind is a whirlwind of negative "what if?" thoughts.

In the nearly three years since I was diagnosed with stage 4 bowel cancer, I have found that writing some of it down helps.

When I have a rough week, I write a little diary – just on my phone, nothing fancy.

So this week, I thought I would share it, to show what really goes on in my mind – behind the smiles and the Insta stories.

It's not easy, I'm still learning to live when I should be dead.

Friday, September 20

Treatment day. Why do I have to spend the day in hospital? Why?

I feel really sick. I woke up at 3am thinking my liver is packing it in.

But, thankfully bloods today show it's fine – I had the shakes again while waiting for the results.

In fact, truth be told, I ran away, like a terrified child.

Pushed my appointment back until after lunch because I was too scared to face it.

It's not that the hospital is a bad place, it's just that I see people either really ill, or those just about to end their treatment.

I'm sad and happy for each of them, but I feel a bit angry. Angry that for me, this will always just be a part of my new normal. My cancer life.

I'm forever grateful for the stability and realistic reassurance my team gives me, and I am so thankful that I do get to live with cancer.

I've stopped counting the cycles of treatment, it's up in the 30s – maybe the 40s by now.

I don't really care as long as its doing its job.

My back hurts.

Last night I was playing the cereal box game. Last week I ran 10km. But, my mind is telling me it's definitely not that, it's definitely new liver tumours.

My chest hurts too, it hurts to breathe. More tumours.

I'm really dizzy today, maybe it's gone to my brain?

The pre-meds make me tired, and the steroids make me hyper all at the same time.

I try to sleep, I roll into a taxi and roll home to bed.

I want to hide away, run and escape this cancer life.

Saturday, September 21

Bloody steroids. It's 3am and I'm lying away wondering what it feels like to die.

I don't often think like this, but right now it's all I can think about.

I'm worried it will hurt, like really hurt.

My back is agony, and it makes me think death must hurt more. I have this thing about fearing death will be painful, albeit wrong.

But I'm scared. How can I not be?

I've seen too many friends go through it. Every week I see it.

The physical demise of another Insta buddy.

It always starts with a niggle. It's 3am and this definitely feels like more than a niggle.

It must be a massive tumour that's growing out of control.

Yes, yes – I know I was scanned and was stable last month.

But in the game of "splat the tumour", anything can happen.

Today, I spend most of the day horizontal to give my body a rest before the night walk in aid of Cancer Research UK.

It's walk time, and did it. I smiled, I was happy on the outside, but inside I was really struggling.

I switched from the half marathon route to the 10km, that's totally unlike me.

I was knackered and in pain (I'm still not sure what I've done to my back).

I came home and I cried, I hate that my body doesn't work when I need it to.

Sunday, September 22

Pain. Today I am in pain, and it's scaring the hell out of me.

It must be more cancer.

It's 3am again, and the paracetamol I took for my back isn't touching the sides.

I'm crying, pacing up and down.

Should I take myself to A&E? No, I'm really not in the mood to be told I'm dying today.

It can't just be a muscle, heat helps.

Would heat help if it was a tumour?

I need stronger painkillers, I'll call the hospital in the morning.

I'm shattered, I didn't fall asleep again until 6am and even then it was only for an hour.

I'm scared. Really scared.

Monday, September 23

I'm due to go to Manchester to record the start of the new series of our podcast, You,Me and the Big C.

I can't let the side down but I've gone a bit loopy.

Four days of hardly any sleep, uncontrolled pain and my mind convincing me that I'm dying, is a recipe for disaster.

I agree to go to the studios in London and link up instead.

I'm heartbroken at not seeing the team, but I know I have to see my doctor – priorities.

I call my main point of contact on my team, who tells me to come straight in to the Marsden.

I stupidly need to prove I'm OK (to myself more than anything) and I go to work first. If I can work, I can't be dying, right?!

By the time I get to the Marsden and crawl up the steps it's 4pm and I'm in tears.

I see my doctor who gives me stronger painkillers and asks me to come back in the morning for a full assessment.

He's trying to reassure me that in his professional opinion it's a muscular problem, from running (and complicated by all my ops).

He tells me that clinically I'm doing well.

I go home and pace up and down. I drink red wine.

It's not a solution but it is helping my back. And my nerves.

It makes me feel a little less scared. For now.

Living when I should be dead

This isn't meant to be depressing, it's not. Although reading it back, it is a bit.

The point is, yes I do appear positive and smiling on the outside. I do push myself to get up and out and stay busy.

I say 'yes' to too many things, I rush around at 100mph, I dance and drink wine and have fun.

But, I cry, I shake with fear and I am consumed with terror most days too.

My positive outlook is just my way of dealing with this cancer life – and I know it's not for everyone.

My cancer pals have different coping strategies, we're all different.

But we all have one thing in common, we're only human and some days the reality of cancer gets you down.

Today, I'm feeling a bit brighter, I'm in a bit less pain and I'm smiling again.

I gotta take the rough with the smooth – and in the end all that matters is I am still living with cancer.

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