‘Love, life, medical miracles, and battling the odds’ - How one man stays positive living in the shadow of cancer

Catherine Shanahan spoke to John Walsh, who was diagnosed with an extremely rare cancer. For years the father of three was told his struggles and successes would make a great book. When his father died he decided to write it

CONVINCED that death was imminent after weeks of blinding headaches and terrifying episodes of hyperventilating, John Walsh held it together long enough to pen a farewell letter to his mum.

“Mum, by the time you get this, I’ll be dead,” he wrote on the train journey back to his accommodation in Bremen, Germany, after medics dispatched him from hospital with a clean bill of health.