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Approach with curiosity rather than comfort.
#CancerCanDoOne. After Awareness, Then What?
Questioning how cancer is talked about — and what that talk avoids. It focuses on the questions that rarely get asked once awareness has been raised and the conversation moves on.
#CancerCanDoOne Podcast
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WHAT THIS PROJECT IS
This is not another cancer awareness podcast
Cancer awareness is everywhere. Familiar narratives circulate, emotions are exchanged, and the conversation feels meaningful.
What’s missing is scrutiny.
This project exists to question:
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Why certain cancer narratives dominate while others disappear
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What behaviours or decisions are meant to change after awareness is raised
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How well‑intentioned language can feel productive while leaving systems untouched
This is not about improving stories. It’s about examining what those stories quietly replace.
Produced by a non‑cancer volunteer with a background in radio, this work deliberately sits at a distance — close enough to hear the language clearly, far enough to question it without performing reassurance.
WHAT YOU’LL HEAR IN THE PODCAST
What the conversations focus on
Each episode explores what conventional cancer conversations tend to leave out.
Not personal journeys for comfort. Not awareness as an end point.
Instead, the discussions examine gaps, contradictions, incentives, and assumptions — across culture, healthcare, work, media, and everyday language.
The questions are calm, precise, and sometimes uncomfortable. They aren’t designed to inspire. They’re designed to linger.
EPISODE LIST INTRO
These episodes don’t aim to reassure.
They focus on what goes unexamined in cancer discourse — what gets repeated, what gets rewarded, and what quietly goes unchallenged once awareness has been raised.
ABOUT THE APPROACH
Why question the language?
Language shapes what feels possible.
When the same phrases, frames, and stories dominate cancer conversations, they don’t just reflect reality — they constrain it. Certain questions become difficult to ask. Certain outcomes become harder to imagine.
This project treats cancer discourse as something worth examining in its own right — not to provoke outrage, but to reduce complacency.
Episodes
Wednesday Jul 17, 2024
Wednesday Jul 17, 2024
Imagine ignoring that bump or that pain because...you can't afford the cost of a test or the treatment.
That's the stark reality for millions. Some British expats are giving up on their retirement in the sun dream and heading home because health care costs are spiralling beyond reach.
That's certainly true in Northern Cyprus currently gripped by 70 percent plus inflation. Bridget Tuxworth runs a restaurant in Lapta in the territory. She's organising an event to celebrate her 60th birthday for the charity Tulips, currently the only cancer charity in Northern Cyprus. It began in 1993 when local cancer care was almost non-existent.
We'll hear from her later, but first, Susan Tilt is a fundraiser for Tulips. She says the lack of finances and spiralling costs has put lives of all nationalities in danger. And there's no sign of changes soon...
(Bridget's Just Giving Page)
(Tulips Charity)
#cancercandoone #CancerResearchUK #cancerfundraiser #cancerrun #cancerawareness #louthrunforlife
Music: #Uppbeat : License code: OV4JXO0USXKVGKIK
Thursday Jul 11, 2024
Thursday Jul 11, 2024
1,000 + runners, huge crowds and another record-breaker from this national flagship fundraising group in a tiny town. 18 years ago £3,000 was raised - this time around £30,000 plus gift aid. It's June 30, 2024, 7 am and the team has been there for quite a while already...
Music: #Uppbeat : License code: OV4JXO0USXKVGKIK
Saturday Jun 29, 2024
Saturday Jun 29, 2024
If you're showing signs of prostate cancer, it's probably too late. That's a stark fact.
The current test for men isn't 100% accurate as it is but it's by far the best option.
I had mine a couple of months ago which is ridiculous. Stupid. Because men over 50 in the UK are entitled to the test and I'm a long way the other side of that.
I just kept forgetting to go to my GP. NO excuses. So I was lucky. The snag is even some doctors are unsure about all this subject.
And, of course, if you are positive but caught in time, the lifelong effects shape your every day, as you'll hear now ...
#prostatecancer #prostatetest #louthrunforlife #cancercandoone
Music: #Uppbeat : License code: OV4JXO0USXKVGKIK
Wednesday Jun 19, 2024
Wednesday Jun 19, 2024
Louise wasn't prepared to sit back and do nothing. After her double mastectomy, she became a well-known campaigner fighting the stigma faced by women in a similar situation.
Music: #Uppbeat : License code: OV4JXO0USXKVGKIK
Tuesday Jun 11, 2024
Tuesday Jun 11, 2024
Nipples and areolas. For some women who lost nipples and the areola during reconstruction following breast cancer, it can be devastating. In some cases, they no longer feel like a woman.
You can also hear an episode on this podcast from Louise Butcher, The Topless Runner, who opted not to have reconstruction and she strongly supports that choice. But if you do, then what?
Katie Harrington has been a successful tattooist for many years. She knew of nipple and areola tattoos but knew there was probably more to this than she imagined. And she was right. She's back from an intensive course, had her first client and in some ways, it was almost starting out all over again. The stakes are high...
Music: #Uppbeat : License code: OV4JXO0USXKVGKIK
Wednesday Jun 05, 2024
Wednesday Jun 05, 2024
We spoke to NHS Patient Advocate Anna Mamwell before about long-term patient health during and after treatment. It's something she knows all about. Anna also had leukaemia. In hospital for 6 months. And she was terrified.
Music: #Uppbeat : License code: OV4JXO0USXKVGKIK
Wednesday May 22, 2024
Wednesday May 22, 2024
It will take laws and social change combined to save lives. That's the view of Gower Tan, a Fundraiser and volunteer Campaigns Ambassador with Cancer Research UK, and more recently employee in the Campaigns team.
He was a long-term smoker and it took many years of trying to finally quit.
He says smokers can't necessarily be solely blamed for smoking. They're stuck with little or no choice and a highly addictive substance while an industry generates huge profits.
Music: #Uppbeat : License code: OV4JXO0USXKVGKIK
Wednesday May 01, 2024
Wednesday May 01, 2024
Are we doing enough for long-term patient health during and after treatment? And for carers..? NHS Patient Advocate Anna Mamwell, in remission herself, isn't so sure...
Music: #Uppbeat : License code: OV4JXO0USXKVGKIK
Sunday Apr 14, 2024
Sunday Apr 14, 2024
Evenings and weekends. We join the volunteers collecting £3,500 of household items in a couple of hours. And the long haul of encouraging locals to sign up for their flagship charity summer run, on windy days in April. If they didn't do it, no funds for cancer research.
Music: #Uppbeat : License code: OV4JXO0USXKVGKIK
Wednesday Mar 27, 2024
Wednesday Mar 27, 2024
Laurence died from Non-Hodgkin lymphoma a few weeks ago. His partner, Victoria runs the Puddle Ducks Day Nursery with her sister at Alvingham in Lincolnshire. They have two children. Keeping busy is how she's dealing with the days. Because what else can she do..?
And she just wishes someone had answered her question: How long have we got?
Music: #Uppbeat : License code: OV4JXO0USXKVGKIK