Comedian Nick Capper didn’t think much of a small, sensitive lump he found on his testicle while showering. But having time on his hands during the COVID lockdown and knowing his mate’s experience with testicular cancer, he decided to get it checked out and was diagnosed with testicular cancer. While balls jokes were easy to crack, there was nothing funny about his weeks of chemotherapy. Here he shares his experience with the disease that impacts 1000 Aussies blokes each year, the risk factors he wasn’t aware of and his advice men putting off a doctor’s appointment.
It was a small lump about the size of half a pea. I felt it in the shower and it was a little bit sensitive. I thought nothing of it really, but I’d seen my friend Michael Shafar’s comedy show about having testicular cancer a couple of years before and I thought I would just get it checked out. Plus it was lockdown, I had time.
The doctor said there wasn’t usually pain or sensitivity with testicular cancer but that I should get an ultrasound anyway because I was in the high-risk age group, which was news to me. I thought you had to be a lot older. Turns out it’s most common in men in their 20s and 30s.
He got back to me and he was like yeah, you’ve got it.
It was really hard for me to take. You just never think that something like that’s going to happen to you. I’ve always been a pretty healthy guy. I do have an undescended testicle, which is a big risk factor for testicular cancer. All the things that go through your head are crazy. Like, ‘how bad is this going to be?’
I was asking all kinds of people for advice. I think I paid $200 to have a half an hour call with a private doctor. He told me, you just got to get the testicle out and then you can go from there.
So that’s what we did.
I didn’t make a big deal out of it because it didn’t really feel like I had cancer. It felt like I just got a tooth removed or something. I didn’t go for the prosthetic testicle. I heard most guys don’t and besides, no one cares about your testicles. They’re not going to look any better.
After I recovered I felt like life would be back to normal then and it was.
I skipped one follow-up appointment because I went away for the Christmas holidays. But then about two or three months after my procedure I started having pain in the stomach area and it felt like my testicle was growing back. I rang the doctor and he said not to worry it was probably scar tissue and that he’d take a look when I got back.
We did some tests then and they came back that the cancer had spread everywhere. It was awful. It was terrible. The uncertainty of not knowing what was going to happen. I didn’t know whether I was going to die or lose my organs, lose my legs.
I had to do chemotherapy for around four months. It started out ok but after about two or three weeks it all fell apart. I started losing my hair. I started feeling really, really sick. I didn’t want to go anywhere or do anything. You’re too tired to sleep but you’re too tired to watch TV. You can’t really get around so you just stare at the roof. You just feel useless. I also had tinnitus, which is when you have a constant ringing sound in your ear. For the first time in my life, I became kind of moody, you just don’t have the patience. It was a very, very trying time for my partner and I.
But everyone banded together for me and had a fundraiser, which was awesome. My friend Brett Blake organised it and a bunch of stand up comedians got around it. 300 people came and it shows how much people love you because you have no idea.
Speaking with my friend Michael helped so much, he was a real savoir – someone who could guide me through it and break it down simply. Because when you hear the word cancer it really throws you in a pit of panic. You don’t know what to do next. And you don’t know what’s going to happen next.
After chemo, I just tried to get my life back in order, but I didn’t feel right for a very long time after.
My partner was really good, she encouraged me to get back into work. So I did that and tried to forget about it as much as I could.
Every day it was kind of just lingering there in my mind, what if it comes back? But now I’m at a point for the first time that I have mostly forgotten about it. It’s a relief.
I could see the funny stuff about my experience in all the balls stuff. Balls are just inherently funny. You can just say balls and that’s funny. I wrote a heap of material about it. It felt like I was a new comedian again. That felt like a real comeback for me. And then once I did the chemo, there was nothing funny about that. It was just terrible. It took me a very, very long time to write funny stuff about it. When you’re just lying in a bed feeling sick, you’re surrounded by everyone else that feels sick, there’s just nothing funny in it.
I still find it weird that strangers know I’ve got one testicle. It was hard for me to talk about the condition when I was first diagnosed because I didn’t really feel like I had cancer at all. I didn’t want to make a big deal out of it. But I did start to talk about it to spread awareness. To make sure no one else goes through it.
I get messages from a lot of people saying, ‘hey mate, I went and got checked, I had this thing, I wouldn’t have got it checked but I know your experience. I didn’t have testicular cancer, but I had something else that could have been troublesome.’
My advice to other men is to put your pride behind you. Just get checked. If you have any changes in that area, just get checked. Once a year, go get checked by a doctor. Especially if you have an undescended testicle. It’s important.
Most people with testicular cancer just get their testicle out and continue on with their life. I got it early but it still spread. Some of my friends didn’t and it’s had terrible consequences.
Cancer is a terrible experience and it’s terrible on your loved ones too. If you can get ahead of it by checking your balls and seeing a doctor if you notice a change, just do it.
You can watch Nick’s special on Hold Me Closer Tiny Cancer on YouTube or follow him on Instagram.
