I then was sent a letter, suggesting I should have a DNA check, because I’d had it twice and they were againthis was slightly different cancer so it showed more they said a predisposition towards cancer than just breast cancer. So I did, I went to a [name of city] hospital and they took a sample and it came back that BRCA2, which is one of the genes apparently that protects you from cancer, was altered, which put me at a greater risk of breast cancer and prostate cancer, and suggested I had my prostate examined, which I did. It felt normal, the normal sort of feeling at the examination but they decided that, under the circumstances, they would do a biopsy, which proved to be positive that there were some very early signs. It wasn’tit was more than nothing but it was signs of altered cells, pre-cancerous I think they call them or something, so, you know, they discussed it with me and somewhat reluctantly I had a prostatectomy, which was a much bigger operation. It involved more than just an overnight stay in hospital. I was in a week, it was very unpleasant, I had a lot of pain and it wasn’t a nice experience at all.

And you did say when you were talking about the prostatectomy, that you were a little bit more reluctant to go ahead with that operation.

Yes, I think there were twoone of the factors was of course, that I’d probablyaccording to the, again very good support from a prostate support counselling nurse, that I would have probably not actually seen any symptoms for six to eight years. Also, there is an age cut-off point to when they will not do that operation. They will offer you something else. They couldn’t offer me radiotherapy because I’d already had what was pretty close to the maximum dose that people should actually have, so there was no real other option because the hormone treatmentit’s really for people who have advanced cases. So it was a little bitrsquo;this is whatyou can either do nothing or have a prostatectomy’, and in the end I, a bit reluctantly I will admit, I went for it becausethey said, well you’re still young and fit enough to do it. If you leave it and you become unfit, we won’t be able to do it and the treatment will be far worse, and so I was, you know, a bit reluctant but I did, you know, have it done. It was not a good experience.

So, 2006 I think it was, I got a piece of paper that really meant it said, discharged’ on it, so I had to continue to take the tamoxifen for a little longer, and that, as far as I was concerned, was it, until 2008. I wasI discovered a lump in my other breast actually. This time I wasI found it, I have to admit, I was not good about checking my breast regularly, and I’d actually been doing the decking with paint, and I thought, my arm feels tired. And I feltand I thought, oh bother, there’s a lump there. So again, I went to the doctor. He said, Yes, you’ve got a lum. Went through a similar procedure but I’d noticed that in the eight years that things advanced. There wasall the paperwork was a lot less gender-specific and some of that was due to my comments, and this time they had developed a new way of checking the lymph nodes whichwell they do, they look at the sentinel lymph node and they put a wirethey put some dye into your breast. It goes to the first lymph node and they check it on the ultrasound and they put a wire in there to mark it, and this is the day before you have the operation. You go in and they removed, this time, just a lump from my breast and the first two lymph nodes, which was comparatively minor to having sort of most of them removed. And I recovered evenby then I had retired, so it was a lot easier, and because it seemed like this, wella piece of cake, really.