A surgeon held his head in his hands and told a cancer patient “I’m so sorry” after he was forced to halt life-saving surgery.
Dad Steve Cutter, from Peterlee, Co Durham, could have just months to live due to his inoperable peritoneal cancer, which was only discovered in theatre as doctors performed corrective surgery on another form of the disease.
The 68-year-old had previously recovered from colon cancer, but in January - just over a year on from being given the all-clear - he was back on the operating table.
Despite one of the largest stage 4 malignant tumours doctors had ever seen having been removed in November 2020, followed by successful chemotherapy, the cancer had returned.
Retired council employee, Steve, had been called into the hospital for a meeting on Christmas Eve last year to tell him biopsy results had confirmed it.
But the returning cancer was operable and he went under the knife less than three weeks later on January 10, 2022.
Steve remembers feeling odd when he came round.
He didn’t hurt and he hadn’t been given painkillers - instead he was confronted with a series of forms.
The surgeon asked how he felt.
“When he asked that I knew then that there was something wrong,” Steve told the Mirror.
“My words to him were: ‘what have you found?’
“He just put his head in his hands and said ‘I’m so sorry. We couldn’t carry out the operation.’”
The surgeon went on to explain the cancer was a very small tumour and it was contained.
He had noticed lesions and discolouration during the operation and he and his team agreed it was likely peritoneal cancer.
Biopsies were taken and the results came back on January 20 confirming their suspicions.
Steve was told there are only two units in the UK that specialise in peritoneal cancer removal, including The Christie Colorectal and Peritoneal Oncology Centre in Manchester.
However, in February the unit said Steve’s cancer was “beyond any surgery”.
Cancer of this type is rare and is often only spotted at a stage when it’s already too late.
Doctors told Steve the scans he’d been having for 14 months were all directed at his colon cancer and so did pick up the hidden killer.
He is now undergoing further “absolutely horrendous” chemotherapy to kill off the remaining colon cancer and hopefully stop the peritoneal cancer spreading to his organs.
“It was hovering over my liver,” he explained.
“Once it’s in the organs it will be a case of on a bad road.”
He said he often berates his wife and kids - two daughters and a son - for doing ‘Dr Google ’ but he admits he wanted to know how long he might live for their sake.
“If you are lucky you would survive six months or perhaps two years with chemo,” he explained.
“The maximum is five years, so if I am very lucky 2026 is the end date.”
He went on to say: “All cancers are killers but this one, it’s a real bad one. I’ve literally got a timebomb.
“Every day I just wake up and thank whoever, if there’s anybody up there, for letting me wake up the next day.”
The selfless family man - a carer for his wife, who is registered blind - has put everything in place already for his death.
He has arranged for his private pension to be transferred to his wife, and has been down to an undertakers to put a plan in place.
One of his daughters has also been put up to speed on any financial matters, including relating to the house to take the burden off his wife.
“Bereavement is obviously not good for anyone at the best of times but under the circumstances I thought I’d get all that sorted,” he said.
Steve said things have become very difficult at times during the pandemic, as he has had to shield due to his treatment, and he has struggled to contain his emotions.
He said he’d like to apologise to his wife.
“At times, tempers can get a bit frayed because obviously I’ve got this bomb in my head exploding every five seconds and I know I get irritable, I know I get bad tempered,” he said.
“That is not me. I just try to keep it together not to make life more difficult for my wife.”
Referring to the disease and the prospect of his own death, he said: “I can just be sitting and the reality hits me and it’s like a tsunami. Nobody wants to die.”
Steve was originally diagnosed with cancer in October 2020 after doing a free NHS test that came through the door, despite having no symptoms.
His tumour was lodged so high up that any discharge was being dissolved before it passed out of the colon.
He encouraged anyone his age not to just throw the tests away.
