Essex man who had testicular cancer at 22 lives travelling dream in memory of friend who urged: ‘Just go and f****** do it’

A man who discovered he had testicular cancer at 22 after finding a lump in the bath is fulfilling his dream of travelling in Australia after running the Sydney Marathon in honour of his friend who lost his battle with the same illness.

Tom Williams, now 28, was enjoying a relaxing bath one evening in October 2019 when he discovered a pea-sized lump on his left testicle that didn’t feel right.

“My dad always said to me and my two brothers: ‘Lads, make sure you check your balls’. We were like: ‘Alright whatever, Dad’, sort of thing,” he told PA Real Life.

“I was living with my parents at the time. So I went downstairs, like: ‘Dad, I found a lump on my testicle’. He said: ‘You need to get it checked out straight away, like, tomorrow’.”

Tom immediately went to his GP to get it checked, and after having his testicle removed for testing he was told he had Stage 2 testicular cancer which had spread to his lymph nodes. He initially found the concept of getting a testicle removed to be a huge deal – especially with “girls and stuff like that” – but it was a decision that ultimately saved his life.

Tom was diagnosed on December 10, 2019, and began a nine-week intensive course of chemotherapy on January 20, 2020 – “so it was a really s*** Christmas!” he joked. Fortunately, his course of chemotherapy, which meant he was receiving treatment five days a week in hospital along with injecting himself with blood thinners and taking around “10 tablets a day”, was successful, and he was given the all-clear on 5 May, 2020.

“The day you’ve been looking forward to is the day that you get the all clear,” he said.

“It’s like: ‘Okay, I’ll go back to normal now, just carry on with my life’.

“But it changed me so much in so many different ways. I’ve never gone back to the person I was.”

Despite being physically free of his cancer, Tom found the proceeding months to be very difficult emotionally. He battled with his mental health as he processed all that he’d been through, and despite having a strong support network of friends and family he felt no one truly understood what he’d been through.

“I think the thing I found the toughest with it was because I was such a young lad, I couldn’t speak to anybody else that understood what I was thinking and feeling,” he said.

“My mates and my family were really supportive, I was very lucky like that, but they still hadn’t gone through it, so they couldn’t really relate to it.”

Tom felt like an “alien”, having lost his hair and become weaker physically. He couldn’t lift weights in the way he had enjoyed prior to his illness, and worried that people would “look at me funny, because my hair had all gone”.

“It strips you down to nothing,” he said.

“It feels humiliating, really, because you’re like: ‘I feel like I’ve lost my manhood. I’ve lost my testicle, I’ve lost my hair on my head, and my beard, and everything’.”

As he continued to process his illness and recovery, he began to experience what he described as “breakdowns”.

“It was all sort of building up and building up,” he said.

“I just broke down at home once. I was eating dinner with my mum and dad, and I just burst out crying. I pushed the table away, and was like, head in my hands, sobbing, crying – never cried like that before.

“I could feel it happening, but didn’t know why it was happening. And then I started laughing uncontrollably. I basically had a bit of a weird meltdown…

“I felt like I was having a heart attack, but I think it was just the anxiety coming out.”

Through cancer care charity Macmillan, Tom was able to access free counselling, which he described as “brilliant”. He had ten sessions of counselling, which really helped, but still struggled with feelings of isolation and found it hard to come to terms with how starkly his life had changed in just a few months.

While Tom still accesses support through Macmillan, his introduction to The Robin Cancer Trust – the UK’s only testicular, ovarian and germ cell cancer charity – through a family friend led him to forge powerful connections with others who had experienced the illness.

Tom started by going along to fundraising events, including climbing Snowdon with family friend Darren, another testicular cancer survivor who introduced him to the charity, before being introduced to the charity’s CEO Toby Freeman, who lost his 24-year-old brother Robin to a Mediastinal Germ Cell Tumour in 2011.

It was on a video shoot for some social media content for The Robin Cancer Trust that Tom met Callan Rogers. Callan was battling Stage 3 testicular cancer, meaning it had spread further throughout his body, and Tom felt an instant connection with him.

“I remember this guy walked in, covered in tattoos, tattooed on his head as well, and everything…. He just had such a presence,” Tom said.

“He walked in and he was like: ‘Alright, I’m Callan’. It was just an instant connection.”

“He was such a character, like he said things as it was, and he was really inspirational for me,” Tom added.

“It just made me feel great, because I was like, all the things he’s saying and thinking and feeling are exactly the same as what I’m thinking and feeling.”

Tom and Callan exchanged numbers and kept in touch, with Tom joining him on a 10km charity run through Central London in July 2024 to help Callan raise money for his treatment.

Sadly, Callan passed away from cancer in October 2024. He was just 28 years old.

“It hit me really hard, considering I didn’t really know him that well,” Tom said.

Despite only knowing Callan for six months, Tom said he had an enormous impact on him and influenced how he wanted to live his life post-cancer. Tom had worked as a commercial van salesman in Colchester for 10 years, had bought a home, and felt secure and content with his life, but there was one thing in particular that he’d never done: travel to Australia.

He recalled that when he told Callan about this dream, his new friend had responded: “Just f****** do it. Stop messing around.”

“It’s the way he said it, it stuck with me. When he passed away, I was like: ‘I’ve gotta do this’.”

The 2025 Sydney Marathon marked the race’s first as an official World Marathon Major, joining Tokyo, Boston, London, Berlin, Chicago, and New York City as one of the most prestigious marathons in the world. The timing was perfect.

On Sunday, August 31 Tom ran the Sydney Marathon, his third marathon, in memory of Callan.

“It was really tough,” he said of the race.

“It was a lot tougher than I thought it was going to be because where I live in Clacton, it’s really flat, but I didn’t realise how hilly Sydney was…

“But the scenery was awesome, and all the support from everyone watching was really good, cheering you on. It was fantastic, it was breathtaking. It was just hard to take it all in.”

Tom has stayed in Australia since, and is enjoying exploring the sights of Sydney and beyond. This year, he is celebrating five years in remission from testicular cancer, and is working to spread awareness of the importance of checking for lumps, particularly to young men who might never imagine they are at risk.

Testicular cancer is 95% curable if detected early, meaning men surviving five years or more, according to The Robin Cancer Trust website.

The best time to check testicles for lumps, by rolling them one at a time between thumb and fingers and keeping an eye out for anything that doesn’t feel normal for you, is during or just after a hot bath or shower, as they are more relaxed and easier to examine.

“If I’d have waited, I might not be here now to tell the tale,” Tom reflected.

“So it’s a good job that I got checked out straight away, and I made that decision quickly.”