I was diagnosed with cancer twice before I turned 30

Hugo Toovey was less than a year from graduating an as officer in the army when a phone call to his dad changed his life.

The now-36-year-old, from Sydney, asked his dad about a small lump on his testicle who encouraged him to visit a doctor.  

At just 21 years old Hugo was diagnosed with testicular cancer and embarked on a gruelling journey of years-long treatments and chemotherapy. 

The scare made him hyper-vigilant about taking care of his health and going to the doctor when he had any concerns so when his bowels started acting up months after he was given the cancer all-clear he went to the doctor straight away. 

Five years after getting testicular cancer, Hugo was given an unrelated diagnosis of bowel cancer which he’s had treated but still suffers health problems from today. 

He wants young people to be aware they are not ‘invisible’ and being proactive with their health could potentially save their life.  

On June 18 2013, Hugo called up his dad, Simon, to wish him a happy birthday and before hanging up asked him about the lump he noticed six months previously.

‘It was kind of uncomfortable to say but I said, ‘Dad, I’ve got this weird little lump on my testicle’, and I was just seeing what his thoughts were,’ he recalled. 

‘He said, ‘Why don’t you just go check?’. It wasn’t until getting that encouragement from my dad where I thought yeah, that’s a good point.’

Hugo was only 21 at the time and the small pea-sized mass had not been causing him any discomfort or getting in the way of his physically active life training in the army.

‘I had tried to forget about it and pretend it wasn’t there. I was 21, I was the fittest I’ve been in my life so supposedly healthy. That’s why I didn’t go to a doctor,’ he said. 

Just 24 hours after going to the doctor and having an ultra sound, doctors told Hugo he had advanced testicular cancer.

‘Not only did I have testicular cancer because I’d put it off for a while, unfortunately, it meant the cancer had spread,’ he said.

Hugo’s doctors were optimistic that with the right treatment, he would make a full recovery which gave him hope. 

He had his right testicle removed, underwent two years of chemo and had another surgery to remove lymph nodes with pre-cancerous cells. 

Five years after his diagnosis, Hugo had recovered and was excelling in his career in the army. He received the news he was in complete remission.

He was 26, living in Brisbane with his now-wife Amber, had just been promoted to captain and feeling like his ‘life was back on track’. 

‘For the first time in a long time I felt a sense of freedom…I could officially close that chapter off,’ he said.

Just weeks after Hugo was given the cancer all-clear, he started to experience issues with his bowels. 

He started getting abdominal pain, needing to get up in the middle of the night to go to the toilet and having more frequent and urgent bowel movements. 

Hugo had become very proactive about his health due to his experience with cancer and after his condition didn’t improve for two weeks, he visited his GP. 

The doctor sent him to get a colonoscopy which picked up some ‘nasty’ polyps that were sent off for a biopsy and Hugo was told to by his gastroenterologist, Terry, to come back in two weeks for an update. 

‘The next day they gave me a call and said the results came back and Terry needed to see me. You get that sick feeling your stomach. I just knew it was something bad,’ Hugo recalled. 

Hugo received the news he had an ‘aggressive’ bowel cancer, which was completely unrelated to his testicular cancer. 

‘Hearing that was almost a bit confusing. I remember saying, ‘Hang on, I’ve just been given my five-year all-clear scan a few months ago, how is that possible?’,’ he said. 

Needing to ‘act fast’ in case the cancer spread, Hugo soon after underwent a subtotal colectomy where a portion of his colon was removed. 

Hugo then suffered a twisted bowel and had to have another surgery to remove more precancerous cells but his journey was far from over.

To prevent the cancer from spreading to his other organs, Hugo had his entire colon and rectum removed and his recovery was ‘touch and go’. 

‘That was the probably worst I had been or the sickest I had been. I couldn’t eat and drink even a sip of water for about three weeks. My stomach had been operated on so many times and it just wasn’t working,’ he said. 

Hugo wasn’t able to stomach any food or even water and rapidly lost a whopping 22kg in less than a month before he was offered a ‘light at the end of the tunnel’ when his stomach started functioning again. 

‘That was the moment where I just thought Okay, I’m going to get through this. I was having all these little small wins and eventually each day, each week got better,’ he said.

Looking back, Hugo realises his testicular cancer may have saved his life.

‘There is no way as a young 26-year-old, I would have rushed off to a doctor, I would never have pushed having more test done. I would have probably put all that off,’ he said. 

‘If it wasn’t for my testicular cancer, I wouldn’t have learnt the importance of early detection. I knew the importance of seeing a GP, of having these checkups and if something’s not quite right to go off to your doctor.’

Throughout his tumultuous journey, Hugo had constant battles with his mental health behind a brave front he put on for his family. He said the mental battles were sometimes worse than the physical. 

‘I was just so unhappy and depressed. I’d dose up on pain relief to numb everything. I was just in such a bad way that I was almost over it,’ he said.

‘My partner and my family we’re the ones that kept me going. I would just take each day as it came and slowly but surely, you start to see a small glimmer of hope.’

Hugo lived with a stoma bag for eight months which he learned to wear ‘proudly’ as it was a symbol of everything he has been through and survived. 

Two years ago, he had a reversal surgery to return his bowel function but all the procedures have left him with severe internal scarring and ongoing health issues. 

While Hugo’s health battles seem never ending, he has now turned his focus to his and Amber’s son due in April. 

‘My wife and I are expecting a baby baby boy, it’s awesome. I have that distraction, and that’s my new priority. I can’t wait to be a dad,’ he said.  

‘I was expecting that maybe we wouldn’t be able to conceive naturally then, all of a sudden, out of nowhere, we got that amazing news. It gave me something to really look forward to.’

He is using his experience to help other young people and raise awareness about how common cancer can be in Aussies in their twenties and thirties. 

Hugo uses humour as a way to ‘get people talking about their health’ and his favourite party trick is getting his mates to guess which testicle is real and which is fake. 

Hugo is an ambassador for Movemeber for men’s mental health and started his own organisation 25stayalive, encouraging young Aussies to be proactive when it comes to their health. 

‘I’ve heard horror stories where young people in their twenties get turned away from three different doctors then finally find someone to run tests but by that stage have stage-4 bowel cancer,’ he said. 

‘I want to be an advocate young people, making them realise they’re they’re not invincible they’re not bulletproof, that’s something I’ve learned the hard way.’ 

‘It’s all about preventative health care and getting these things early. It’s about a typical young adult to realise they’re not invincible and not to wait until it’s too late.’