My slight insomnia seems more determined than ever right now, so I find myself starting writing this post at 00:30 on Monday morning. I spent Sunday attempting to support my eldest sister Becky as she ran the London marathon. My ‘attempt’ to support her wasn’t because I was not indeed supporting her through my thoughts and words, but because my physical attendance on the day was cut short due to some fairly routine stomach problems. It’s a shame as I came down to London this weekend specifically to support her on her big day, but after only managing to see her once at around the 13 mile mark, my stomach problems kicked in. I tried to persevere, but sometimes these issues aren’t down to perseverance, and I didn’t want to embarrass myself in central London, in front of my family and my new wife. That really would have been a test of our vows. ‘Bowels testing the vows’. What a horrible yet intriguing sentence. Perhaps it’d make a good play. Someone should write it.

Becky hasn’t run a marathon before and judging by her first message after finishing, I’m not sure she’ll be rushing to do another one. “Fuck am I ever doing that again,” read her first message in our family WhatsApp group. My dad isn’t a fan of swearing, so she must have really meant it. As we’ve gotten older, we’ve gotten lax with our swearing around our dad, but you could tell she really meant those words; it wasn’t just inflammatory for the sake of winding up my now retired dad (he’s finally officially a pensioner as of the close of business last Friday, despite actually taking his pension a few years ago).

Whether she does one again or not, it’s a huge achievement. I know people think every Godley has some natural trait which makes them able to do marathons at the drop of a hat, but it really isn’t true. Some of us go to pretty extreme lengths with our love of exercise – my brother, Greg, goes to extremely extreme extremes, but we’ll come back to that later. Becky isn’t typically one of them, though. She enjoys running to keep fit, but also enjoys actually having free time where she isn’t training. She also probably enjoys occasionally dressing up, having a few too many drinks and getting blisters from her nicer looking shoes, as opposed to already having them from running too many miles, too many times and over too many weekends. I hope she will get to indulge in a few of these now that the marathon is out of the way. She has earned it.

In all seriousness, she really isn’t one of the Godley’s who loves the punishment that comes with these more extreme events. Or she isn’t historically, anyway. Who knows where this will take her now… I know that people will think I’m being modest here, as I have completed quite a few marathons and even more ultramarathons, but I really do put myself in the same category as her in terms of natural ability. I don’t have a lot of natural ability with running, and I think she feels the same way. Any skill I had with running came from sheer determination. I just kept doing it and doing it and doing it, never getting loads faster, but managing to go a lot further. Each time I entered a new marathon, I told myself that this would be the one where I would do an impressive time, but it never really happened. At my first ever marathon, I finished with a time of 3hr 47, and I felt relatively happy, but I thought I could do better. The only other road marathon I completed was the Brighton marathon, and a combination of hot weather and having pancreatic cancer, but not knowing that I had pancreatic cancer, meant I finished with a less-than-impressive 4hr 3. The only thing that I consider quite impressive in my speed repertoire is my half marathon PB of 1hr 38, but this is still pretty slow for someone who trained as hard as I did. Ultramarathons were always more my thing – I could dig deep over distance, and that seemed to give me an edge. But anyway, this isn’t meant to be about me…

Becky may not love the punishment of a tough training schedule, and she may not have the natural speed and agility that my dad had, but she’s ran a marathon. In many ways, it is more impressive to see someone finish a marathon who is not a seasoned marathoner, than it is to watch someone complete their 40th marathon that year. The grit and determination that she showed to get over that finish line is admirable and inspiring. The fact that she also did the marathon in aid of The Christie, the cancer-specialist hospital that provide my oncology care and who have almost definitely extended my life considerably, if not actually saved it from the hands of pancreatic cancer, makes it even more special.

My surgeon told me that most oncology teams in the country, if not the world, would have told me that nothing further could be done based on my diagnosis (stage 3 pancreatic cancer, with an artery fully enclosed by the tumour) and the images produced by the CT scan post-chemotherapy. My specialist at The Christie recognises the limitations of these scans, however, and is an incredibly forward-thinking individual when it comes to the treatment of pancreatic cancer. He is an example of the excellence that The Christie has become associated with. That excellence attracts excellence, and that is how he became associated with my surgeon, Mr Nicola de´ Liguori. Together, their pioneering approach to treating pancreatic cancer, led to the full removal of the tumour, against all of the odds.

Where others would have accepted defeat, they pioneered an approach of calculated risk – daring to hope that by taking on that risk in major surgery, they might be able to generate a better result for me. They did, and I can’t thank them enough for it. Mr de´ Liguori specifically requested that I name him in my blog posts, as he wants to encourage this type of approach more often when treating pancreatic cancer. I’m unsure about my oncologist, and whether he would want me to speak about him by name, so I won’t name him specifically. Mr de´ Liguori has seen more people approaching him for a second opinion on scan results, and he wants this to continue. Many people don’t even realise that one can survive without a pancreas. My brother Freddie is the most recent person to experience this, as he told a friend in the pub that his brother had recently had his entire pancreas removed. “You must be wrong, Freddie. You can’t live without a pancreas,” his friend responded. Freddie then wondered whether he had got it wrong, or if I had even gotten it wrong and had misunderstood what had occurred in the surgery. Neither of us were wrong, though. It just isn’t common.

There are probably a lot of reasons that a total pancreatectomy is uncommon – sometimes the tumour is too established, and it wouldn’t save the patient’s life. Sometimes the cancer has already spread. I’ve seen it sighted online that it is the huge lifestyle changes post-surgery, with the patient being diabetic and needing enzyme replacement for life, that makes a total pancreatectomy an unattractive option. This last one intimidated me for weeks after the surgery, but I feel very differently about it now. The lifestyle changes are immaterial if it saves your life – I am proof of that; you can adapt very quickly, and all of the lifestyle changes just become normal. Far better than just dying. There are almost undoubtedly many cases where such an approach could save a patient’s life, or give them more valuable years. I’m lucky enough to have received treatment at two world-class hospitals, The Christie and Manchester Royal Infirmary. I’m about to start chemotherapy back at The Christie in a few weeks, and I’m extremely glad to be back under their care for what will hopefully be the last phase of my treatment for cancer.

Becky is just under £30 away from hitting her fundraising target, and it would mean the world to her if you could help push her over that goal. You can donate here if you are willing and able.

My brother Greg seems to have far more natural ability in terms of speed and stamina than Becky and me. He gets that from my dad. I put myself far more in my mother’s camp – a person who has run a marathon in her day, and even did a few trail ultra marathons, but who did not indulge in a running schedule totalling an average of over 100 miles a week, acting like it was totally normal like my dad did when he was in his 20’s. Greg is definitely following in my dad’s footsteps. He may have even created his own footsteps on the path to self-damnation with his latest series of events, though.

In the past few weeks, Greg has challenged himself to 3 separate events. He has cycled from Inverness to Preston, done a double Iron Man (where you do twice the distance of the swim, bike and run) and he is currently in Hawaii to compete in the Iron Man world championship, after qualifying for his age category. I don’t really need to speak too much more about it all – the level of exercise that Greg is now engaged in is utterly ridiculous. There is a bittersweet element to watching him challenge himself in this way for me – I never really got into the Iron Man stuff, but we used to do a lot of ultra marathons together. I hope to get back to a place where we can do this together again, but I fear that I will forever be slowing him down now. Perhaps he needs slowing down a little bit, though.

Greg is raising money for Pancreatic Cancer Action, a charity who have helped me out a lot since being diagnosed. Their founder, Ali Stunt, is a 15+ year survivor of pancreatic cancer; that is not something you see very often. It would be easy to chalk this down to ‘luck’, but you start learning that there is more to these things than simple luck. Her determination to help others resulted in her setting up her charity and the work they do is so incredibly important to people like me. She has helped me out immensely throughout my treatment and continues to help me out now. I’m so grateful to her and her team for everything the have done for me, and am so happy that Greg has chosen to raise money for them.

Greg is a couple of hundred away from reaching his target – you can donate here if you would like to. The world championships are happening on Thursday in Hawaii, so be sure to check out the Just Giving page to find out how Greg does in the event.