Whether you’re King or commoner, cancer makes you confront your mortality

It’s unavoidable that when you hear, “it’s cancer,” as I did in autumn 2022, it comes as a terrible shock. However, I am 90 years old, and while the King is younger – he is 75 – so thoughts of mortality aren’t strange to either of us. Our parents have died and people of our own generation are beginning to; I open the obituary pages and find that friends’ names are there.

In many ways, the death of a parent is actually more shocking than the thought of your own impending demise, because it is such a terrible loss. But it does familiarise you; as a 25-year-old, you expect to live forever. You think, “not me, surely”. But when you’re over 70, you’re not expecting to compete in the Olympics. You know you have a finite amount of time, although you hope it will be quite a long while. I am sure the King, who is quite introspective as a person, will have given this some thought over the years.

My diagnosis of colon cancer was met with a sense of sad resignation. I thought: “Something was bound to come up eventually.” However, the moment you are diagnosed, they whip you into hospital. You do have a sense that everybody is marshalling all the resources they have to help you out, which is immensely reassuring. I was in and out quite quickly as I had keyhole surgery. And then came the nasty bit – the chemotherapy that followed. It made me feel really ill and vile, but that is the price you have to pay. At least you’re home, you’re on the mend, and you’re with people who love you.

These are all important things, because a diagnosis of cancer of any kind really does bring you up short against the idea of mortality. The King will be able to marshal the very best treatments, which I was fortunate enough to be able to. But cancer is a great leveller; it can affect us all, whether you are a sovereign or just the average person.

In the weeks following my diagnosis, I tried to be philosophical about it. I turned away from prose and sought comfort in poetry: John Donne, Shakespeare, of course, and Blake. They all bear witness to the fact that life is finite, precious and to be cherished. Music, too. I thought: I must enjoy music as much as I always have, and perhaps it added to the intensity of my pleasure.

Nature was a great source of comfort, as it may well be for the King. I spent more time looking out at the stars and the moon. I live in a studio flat, which looks out onto a garden and trees and flowers. Watching nature, I was comforted by the fact that my life is part of a natural cycle; the autumn leaves were falling, and I thought, well, I’m a falling leaf as well. I would imagine the King is thoughtful about it and able to cope.

If someone came to me newly diagnosed, I would give them this advice: make the most of every day, because each one is a gift. Look through the window; look at the sun and look at the stars. Be consoled by the fact that you’re just a speck in the universe. I’m not religious. I’m a humanist, so I have what you might call spiritual values, but they aren’t attached to anything supernatural. I turned to poetry more; I think you can find a sort of depth in poetry that you need when you’ve had alarming news.

On a practical level, I knew where to go for advice and expert opinion; I didn’t hesitate to speak to specialists about it, and I didn’t keep my diagnosis a secret. However, I didn’t discuss it much with my children as I didn’t want it to become a family issue. I live on my own, I don’t have a partner and my children were concerned, but they were careful not to be seen as panicking or anxious. My advice to the family of anyone diagnosed with cancer would be to try to take it calmly and offer practical help; you don’t want people flapping around saying: “Oh dear, how terrible, how dreadful.”

Three months ago, I went back to have tests again, and I was told I’m in the clear, which is wonderful. The message to remember is: a lot of people recover from cancer, as they say in the advertisements. You have to believe them. But of course you never lose the sense that it may come back. My lesson is that, when you get older, the shadow of mortality isn’t such a bad thing.

‘You know you have a finite amount of time, although you hope it will be quite a long while’