Learning Resilience
The inspiring Jake Bailey shares his story
Jake Bailey was just 18 when he got the news he had a very aggressive form of cancer, Stage 4 Burkitt’s non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. A week later, and by then very ill, he delivered an end-of-year speech at Christchurch Boys’ High that went viral and touched hearts around the world. This year, after five years of remission, he was finally cleared of his cancer. We meet the now 23-year-old whose story continues to move and inspire so many.
JAKE BAILEY INSISTS HE’S JUST AN ORDINARY guy who just happens to have had cancer and the good fortune to have survived it. At our interview, over a morning coffee (in his case, water) at a suburban café in Christchurch, Jake is barely recognisable as the gaunt teenager who made that courageous speech back in late 2015. He looks fit and healthy, full of energy. Personally, I have my doubts as to the ordinariness of this former Christchurch Boys’ High School head boy, either then or now.
Since making that speech, he has endured months of cancer treatment, spoken to tens of thousands of people around New Zealand and abroad, written a number one
New Zealand bestseller ( What Cancer Taught Me) and had a documentary made about him ( The Common Touch). A couple of sentences from his speech were voted as Massey University’s 2015 Quote of the Year: ‘Here’s the thing – none of us gets out of life alive. So be gallant, be great, be gracious and be grateful for the opportunities you have.’
I ask Jake what he thinks about this quote today, looking back, and whether the quote of the year selection was a proud moment for him at the time. Not really, it seems. It wasn’t written as a standout quote and he remains a little perplexed as to why these lines received the accolade. ‘ I’m forever grateful to the people who loved it and consequently supported me through my cancer – if I had known it was going to go viral, I might have thought about the wording more deeply,’ he says.
Accolades do not sit particularly comfortably with Jake. He’s become a full-time popular keynote speaker as a result of his experiences but worries that some people may see his speaking engagements as a kind of ego trip. He freely admits he has no real qualifications other than lived experience and a drive to reach out to and support other people going through experiences of cancer and adversity – particularly young people. With that goal in mind, he launched a new venture last year called SORTD – Schools’ Online Resilience Training and Development to provide video-based educational resources for high school students. The content, developed in collaboration with psychologists and detailing proven strategies for wellbeing, went out to 5,000 students last year and he has plans to roll it out to more schools over the next 12 months.
‘There is nothing currently in the curriculum specifically educating young people on how to overcome challenges and
face difficulties in life. Many have a fear of the future, fear of others’ opinions and are struggling with various day-today issues. I truly believe that resilience is the single greatest factor in how successful and happy a young person will become in life. An ability to bounce back from the things which will go wrong for you is far more important than how naturally talented you are, how much money you are born into or how lucky you are.
‘Prior to cancer I wouldn’t have necessarily classed myself as an especially resilient young person. It was going through that experience which taught me many of these strategies to overcome adversity, as well as showing me the impact of resilience on your life. SORTD is all about sharing these resilience strategies with other young people so they are better equipped to face life’s inevitable adversities – preparing them for the tough times, before they crop up.’
As an ambassador for the Māia Health Foundation, Jake is also supporting fundraising efforts to make a tangible difference in healthcare in Canterbury. Last year, he actively helped promote Māia’s Shine a Light appeal to raise funds for a modern, fit-for-purpose outpatient facility for Child and Youth Mental Health. ‘There is a sense of satisfaction to see that, in some small way, I’ve been able to have a positive impact.’
He also established the Jake Bailey Cup for Gallantry to recognise Christchurch Boys’ High School students who have shown great courage, resilience and bravery in the face of adversity. Last year’s joint winners were two students who had faced mental health struggles and went on to set up a support group for fellow students.
Two words jump out in conversation with Jake: ‘incredibly fortunate’. It is how he feels about the support he’s had from friends and family and the medical team who saved his life; ‘incredibly fortunate’ too to have had cancer young, without a mortgage or kids to worry about through treatment; ‘incredibly fortunate’ to still be alive. Jake started dating his partner Jemima 10 days before being diagnosed with cancer and is hugely grateful that she stayed with him throughout his treatment – ‘despite encouragement from me that it would be best for her sake if she walked away from the situation’ – and she remains ‘an incredible support’ in his life.
In 2016, he moved to the Gold Coast to be with Jemima through her university studies there and continues to split his life between New Zealand and Australia, though Covid disrupted that last year.
‘Prior to the border closure, I’d been coming back to
New Zealand for work and speaking engagements every fortnight, as well as speaking in the United States for a few organisations including the US Forest Service and the US Department of Agriculture. It was really brilliant to be getting some traction on the US speaking circuit but clearly Covid has changed things drastically. Suddenly Australia felt a long way from home and the presentations had to go online. It’s not the same when you’re talking to a laptop!’ Thanks to the travel bubble with Australia, Jake has been able to get home again – and even spare some time for a latitude interview!
There is that expression about being ‘wise beyond one’s years’ and through talking to this thoughtful young man, I can see that this is what cancer has done for him. Just getting through cancer treatment to remission in early 2016 must have been challenging enough, but around that time Jake had a fresh setback: nerve damage in his legs (‘peripheral neuropathy’) caused by his lifesaving treatment that meant he was unable to walk unsupported. There was no guarantee back then that he would ever regain full use of his legs. ‘That was the lowest point for me. There were times when my parents had to carry me up stairs, when Jemima had to help me roll over in bed at night. All I could do was wait and hope. I was relieved to be in remission, yet it also coincided with this loss of independence and uncertainty about my future.’
Having fully regained his mobility by mid-2016, Jake has
‘There is a sense of satisfaction to see that, in some small way, I’ve been able to have a positive impact.’
gone on to make the most of it. In 2019, he cycled 1,400 km over nine days from Sydney to Geelong with Tour de Cure Australia to raise funds for cancer research. He completed two days of the same event this April, riding 300 km between Newcastle and Muswellbrook and has also competed in the Coast to Coast multisport event in both 2019 and 2020.
‘An interest in endurance sport for me has stemmed directly from my experience of going through cancer. It is not just about wanting to be active for my health, but about exploring the limits of mind and body. There are some quite poignant parallels between endurance sport and the cancer treatment journey: physically, there is the necessity of being able to just sit with an uncomfortable sensation for a prolonged period of time without wanting to try and escape it, and mentally, there’s this need to utilise the tremendous power of mind over body when things are at their toughest.’
At the time of our interview, Jake was training for his first 50 km ultra-marathon in Brisbane. In his sights for 2022 is the gruelling 85 km Old Ghost Ultra – with more than 2,600 metres of ascent, it’s described as ‘the ultimate test in backcountry running’.
To this day, Jake has no regrets about having had cancer though acknowledges his own naivety probably acted as a wellbeing buffer. He had complete faith in the treatment process and conviction that he would survive. Throughout the remission period, he never worried about the possibility of the cancer coming back.
‘I continue to support young people going through cancer and that has given me a healthier understanding that I had a fairly easy passage through cancer and that I was pretty oblivious to my own mortality at the time. I have seen other people of my age – with dreams and aspirations just as vivid as my own – go through the same experience and not make it. That leaves me with a sense of responsibility to live life to the fullest on their behalf, to make the most of the opportunities they won’t get. It’s not a burden but a privilege to carry those people on my shoulders in a sense. I feel a powerful sense of
‘I don’t hold myself up as some kind of guru, but I feel there is nothing more fulfilling you could do with your life or work than to try and positively impact other people.’
gratitude for the most mundane daily activities like being able to walk my dog around the park and feel the fresh air and sunshine on my face.’
He tells me that before cancer came along he’d been planning to enrol for a double degree in commerce and law at The University of Auckland. Instead, his life took a different path with the experience of cancer bringing opportunities to help others in a way he’d never previously thought possible.
‘People sometimes tell me that what I’ve shared has helped them through some difficult times in their lives, or helped them to support another person going through cancer. I don’t hold myself up as some kind of guru, but I feel there is nothing more fulfilling you could do with your life or work than to try and positively impact other people.’•
For those wanting to hear more about Jake’s story he will be speaking as part of the Inspire21 event, at the Christchurch Arena, on Sunday 5 September.