I’m at the stage now where I start active treatment tomorrow! I feel oddly excited, and anxious at the same time. The results of my full body CT scan (thorax, abdomen, pelvis, neck and head) showed no further spread of disease, apart from within both of my lungs. This does still land me with a stage 4 diagnosis, which I’m finding tricky to get my head around.

My report states multiple pulmonary metastasis evident, with no spread to other organs, nor, perhaps surprisingly, to my lymphatic system (stage 3 melanoma, and the usual progression of the cancer from stage 2). I received the results from my new oncology consultant – whom I love! Dr F is the perfect combination of genuinely sympathetic and reassuringly authoritative, and gave me a master class consultation in how to speak to a cancer patient. His treatment plan is 4 initial infusions (1 every 3 weeks) of a combination immunotherapy – Ipilimumad and Nivolumab. This is a treatment that has only been available on the NHS for the past year, and would cost me a small fortune if I was to be living in America for example. Immunotherapy works by taking the brakes off your immune system, enabling it to fight cancer cells in your body. It’s revolutionising cancer treatment across the world, and is a really fascinating concept – that your own immune system can be supercharged to fight something as aggressive as melanoma. I’ll then get scanned after the 12 weeks is up, to see if I’m responding and the next line of treatment will be decided at that point.

I feel a little bit like a fraud, in the fact that my treatment appears to be noninvasive. At this point anyway. I don’t need to have any surgery yet, and I don’t need to have chemotherapy. The immunotherapy comes with a separate set of potential side effects, but very different to those associated with chemotherapy.