Navigating Stroke Recovery, MND, and Prostate Cancer: Finding Strength in AdversityFacing Multiple Diagnoses: A Test of Resilience
Receiving a diagnosis of stroke, motor neuron disease (MND), or prostate cancer is life-changing on its own. But what happens when someone faces all three? It’s a reality that demands incredible strength, resilience, and adaptability.
Many stroke survivors focus on regaining mobility, speech, and independence, only to find themselves navigating further health challenges down the road. A diagnosis of MND or prostate cancer after stroke can feel overwhelming, making the road to recovery seem even steeper. However, through determination, support, and a shift in mindset, it is possible to find meaning, hope, and quality of life despite these hurdles.
The Overlapping Challenges of Stroke, MND, and Cancer
Each condition comes with its own set of challenges, but when combined, they create a unique and complex journey:
Stroke Recovery
A stroke can affect mobility, cognition, speech, and energy levels, requiring a tailored rehabilitation approach. Physical therapy, occupational therapy, and speech therapy play a crucial role in regaining function and independence.
Motor Neuron Disease (MND)
Unlike stroke, MND is a progressive neurological condition that weakens muscles over time. While there is no cure, management strategies such as physiotherapy, adaptive equipment, and speech devices can help improve quality of life.
Prostate Cancer
Prostate cancer treatments—including radiation, surgery, and hormone therapy—can lead to fatigue, urinary incontinence, and emotional strain. Combined with stroke and MND, maintaining strength and energy levels becomes even more challenging.
Managing Life with Stroke, MND, and Cancer1. Mindset and Mental Resilience
A growth mindset is essential when facing multiple health challenges. It’s normal to experience frustration, fear, or grief, but shifting focus toward small victories can make all the difference. Journaling, meditation, and counseling can provide emotional support and clarity.
2. Rehabilitation and Adaptation
Even after stroke recovery, those with MND may find themselves needing additional mobility aids. Finding new ways to stay active, like adaptive exercises, hydrotherapy, and assisted walking devices, can help maintain strength and mobility for as long as possible.
3. Managing Energy and Fatigue
Fatigue is a common issue across all three conditions. Strategies like:
Prioritizing rest and pacing daily activities Eating a nutrient-rich diet that supports energy levels Engaging in light movement or stretching
4. Building a Strong Support System
Navigating these diagnoses alone can feel overwhelming. Community support, online groups, and family involvement can offer much-needed encouragement. Many survivors find purpose and motivation through volunteering or mentoring others.
5. Advocating for Your Health
With multiple conditions, medical care can become complex. It’s important to:
Keep a detailed record of symptoms and medications Ask doctors about treatment interactions and alternative therapies Consider clinical trials and emerging treatments for MND or cancer
Hope, Strength, and a New Perspective
Facing stroke, MND, and prostate cancer is undeniably tough, but it is possible to redefine what life after these diagnoses looks like. Many survivors discover unexpected strength, new passions, and deeper appreciation for life.
You are not alone in this journey. Whether through rehabilitation, community support, or personal resilience, there is always a way forward.
Share Your Story
If you or a loved one is navigating life after stroke, MND, or prostate cancer, I’d love to hear from you! Share your experience in the comments or connect with our community for support.
Get More Support
If you found this helpful, check out my book, The Unexpected Way That a Stroke Became the Best Thing That Happened, available on Amazon or recoveryafterstroke.com/book.
Stroke, Cancer & MND: How Clive Branson Found Strength in Adversity
From stroke to cancer to MND, Clive Branson’s journey proves that resilience and mindset can redefine recovery. Watch his inspiring story now.
Clive Branson’s Website
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Highlights:
00:00 Introduction and Acknowledgements
01:50 Clive Branson’s Introduction
03:39 Initial Stroke Experience and Deficits
08:18 Impact of Subsequent Health Challenges
13:51 Volunteering and Mental Health Advocacy
23:33 The Power of Support in Recovery
36:37 Prostate Cancer Diagnosis and Treatment
45:30 Expect the Best, Prepare for the Worst: Prostate Cancer Awareness
54:05 Mental Health and Personal Growth
57:58 Resilience, Connection, and Reinvention
1:13:16 Final Thoughts and Encouragement
Transcript:
Introduction and Acknowledgements
Bill Gasiamis 0:00
Welcome everyone before we dive into today’s powerful conversation, I just wanted to take a moment to thank you for being a part of this amazing community. Whether you’re sharing the podcast, leaving reviews or simply tuning in each week, your support makes all the difference. Together, we’re creating a space where stroke survivors, caregivers and allies can feel seen, heard and inspired. Since 2015 I’ve been covering the cost of producing the recovery after stroke podcast to ensure that stroke survivors, caregivers and their loved ones have access to free, valuable resources.
Bill Gasiamis 0:39
If you’ve received tremendous value from these episodes and would like to support the show you can do so at patreon.com/recoveryafterstroke, your generosity helps me continue to bring you these important conversations. A huge thank you to my most recent Patreon supporters, Ted, Rick, Deanne, Pat Bryce and Alessandro. Your support means the world to me and helps ensure that I can keep producing these episodes that support stroke survivors everywhere. I also want to take a moment to address something important.
Bill Gasiamis 1:15
If you’re not in a position to support the podcast financially, simply listening to the ads without skipping them is also a huge help. These ads are essential in offsetting some of the production costs, and just by letting them play, you’re contributing to keeping these resources alive for stroke survivors and their families. I’m incredibly grateful for everyone who listens, supports and engages with the podcast in any capacity. And remember my book The Unexpected Way That A Stroke Became The Best Thing That Happened.
Introduction – Clive Branson
Bill Gasiamis 1:50
It’s been a valuable resource for many stroke survivors and their families, offering practical guidance and hope during difficult times. You can find it on Amazon by searching my name, Bill Gasiamis, or by heading to recoveryafterstroke.com/book. Now let’s get into today’s episode. My guest Clive Branson has faced an incredible journey, not just surviving a stroke, but also overcoming immense physical and mental health challenges, including a motor neurons disease diagnosis and prostate cancer.
Bill Gasiamis 2:27
In this conversation, Clive shares how he navigated the darkest moments, found resilience and now dedicates his life to inspiring and supporting others. This is an episode filled with wisdom, perspective and hope let’s jump in. Clive Branson, welcome to the podcast.
Clive Branson 2:45
Thank you, Bill. Thank you very much for asking me, and it’s nice to meet you.
Bill Gasiamis 2:51
Tell me a little bit about what happened to you.
Clive Branson 2:54
Okay, well, where to start really, I was 37 years old, I’m married. I’ve been married for a million years to a wonderful lady that I’ve known since we were 12 or 13 years old, and we’ve been married for nearly 30 years now, but we’ve got four boys, so it’s a busy house. Now, I’ve been in the Royal Air Force, and then I did nearly 20 years with the Ministry of Defense, and I was probably classed as Mr. Ordinary, really. However, I did have a brain hemorrhage when I was born, but sort of fully recovered from that.
Clive Branson – Initial Stroke Experience and Deficits
Clive Branson 3:39
But I’ve always had migraine headaches, quite badly, to be honest. So that’s a little bit of relevant background. So I’m 37 I’m at home, and I’m lying on the couch because I’ve had a headache, which is no surprise to anybody. My wife, my brother-in-law and one of my boys was at home, so I wake up, no any sort of extra pain or distress, and my brother in law says to me ‘Oh, you’re back in the room, then Clive, you’re back with us. And what I replied back was complete gobbledygook, and it didn’t really register with me. I was probably just waking up.
Clive Branson 4:24
Certainly registered with him, say that again, and it was exactly the same. So again, no pain or distress, just the realization that I could not connect my brain with my mouth. So I did a bit of a bloke thing, and I just thought, I’ll stand up and shake it off, get some fresh air. Perhaps only made a few paces, and I collapsed. So I had a seizure. I’ve never had seizures before, obviously far more scary for the. Was that were there than me, because at this point I was sort of out of it. And yeah, I was sort of blue lighted in. They obviously didn’t know what was wrong with me.
Clive Branson 5:10
It was actually the first responders that came before the ambulance, and they got the oxygen in, etc. Told my wife not to be on her own, that there was, they started the scans and stuff, and my brain had started to swell. Then they discovered that there was a clot and it had gone up to the artery. And thankfully, Bill, somebody was up there, up there was looking over me because as they were prepping me for surgery and other things. Thankfully, the clock dissolved and it passed. So I had possibly a week in hospital, and I was unsteady on my feet.
Clive Branson 5:54
And I either but a few stops and gaps in my conversations and my speech and but it was definitely Bill, it was definitely one of those moments really, you know, I was in hospital with an awful lot of poorly people who definitely weren’t going home, whole, if at all, and I just wanted my life back, you know, at any cost, it was a massive realization that I knew how lucky I’d been and and so I mean, I’m 54 now. My medical history between now and then is unbelievable. But yeah, that was the start of of a challenging time Bill, to be honest.
Bill Gasiamis 6:41
I hear you, so it was in 2007 is that right?
Clive Branson 6:46
That’s right.
Bill Gasiamis 6:48
It’s been a while, right? And what are your deficits? Do you have any deficits?
Clive Branson 6:54
Well, I think about this a lot Bill, my memory was definitely affected. I’m not pretending I had a photographic memory or anything like that, but I think my short term memory really struggled. And also, if I’m talking to somebody, particularly in a professional capacity, and there’s a quite a lot of information thrown at me in one go. It might be a formula they’re trying to explain to me, particularly if it involves numbers, I’ll catch the first bit. And I have what they want me to understand, but I can’t then process that.
Clive Branson 7:37
And that hasn’t changed from then to now. If anything, it’s probably got a bit worse, but that might just be because I’m getting old now, but yeah that and fatigue, I think fatigue was something that it was obviously worse for the first few weeks and getting home, but I don’t think my battery life has been anything like, you know, I’ve been in the RAF, as I said, I’ve done a bit of sort of novice box, I was relatively fit, and, as I say, really sort of active family life. But yeah, my battery life definitely didn’t recover.
Impact of Subsequent Health Challenges For Clive Branson
Bill Gasiamis 8:18
You know, before, the reason I asked you those questions because I was going to kind of, you know, I like to play the devil’s advocate. You don’t look like someone who had a stroke. You don’t sound like someone who had a stroke. You’re saying a stroke story. It happened in 2007 you were 37 and my question was going to be, why? Even now, why such a long time after the stroke, did you feel the need that you need to get on a podcast and share your story, like, why?
Clive Branson 8:53
Because of what’s happened to me since, and because of my various medical challenges, both physical and mental. I’ve reflected on my life in general. I’ve reflected on my own mortality, and it’s very apparent to me that that stroke was the trigger for my whole body, changing, my whole capacity for certain things changing. And I mean, I can’t pretend that there’s any kind of link between my motor neurone disease and certainly my prostate cancer.
Clive Branson 9:40
But in terms of my ability to fight back from certain situations, I’ve had to almost understand my body a lot more and be in tune with my body a lot more. And that started in 2007 not when I had the last five years of my life.
Bill Gasiamis 10:05
Let’s take a quick pause here before we continue with Clive Branson’s incredible journey. I wanted to share a little bit about how you can support the podcast. If this podcast has added value to your life, I’d love your support on Patreon by becoming a patreon at patreon.com/recoveryafterstroke, you’ll help me continue to create these conversations while joining a community dedicated to stroke recovery, resilience and growth. Another simple way to support the podcast is by listening to the ads without skipping them.
Bill Gasiamis 10:37
These ads help cover the production costs, and just by letting them play, you’re helping keep this resources free for stroke survivors and their families. If a Patreon membership is impossible for you right now, this is a great way to contribute and ensure that I can keep bringing you these valuable conversations. And if you haven’t already, check out my book, The Unexpected Way That A Stroke Became The Best Thing That Happened. It’s available on Amazon and recoveryafterstroke.com/book.
Bill Gasiamis 10:37
And it’s packed with insights, practical guidance and motivation for your recovery journey. Now let’s get back to Clive Branson and hear more about how he’s navigating life after stroke. MND and prostate cancer and why he believes resilience and perspective are key to overcoming life’s toughest challenges.
Bill Gasiamis 11:28
I hear, okay, I was going to ask you about the current medical conditions that you’re dealing with as well. So prostate cancer was that first was the MND diagnosed first.
Clive Branson 11:42
The MND was first Bill. There was a perfect storm for me, to be honest, 2018 andobviously, this is a stroke recovery podcast, so I don’t want to sort of take up too much time with this, but there was a perfect storm, and that involved, I lost both my parents completely different sort of one Parkinson’s, one COVID, but I got the diagnosis for slowly progressive Motor Neurone Disease. Then I discovered that I’d got what was, stage two prostate cancer, and it is currently stage three, and then I had a mental health health breakdown.
Clive Branson 12:24
I ended up in psychiatric hospital, and then I started to rebuild myself, and that’s because I’ve got a support network, I’ve got family that it’s just not everybody’s got that Bill, have they? And in my rebuilding, when I found my confidence again, and when I found my new identity, and the identity crisis was a challenge. My whole picture, from this, from the stroke on, is something that I got me thinking. I thought, I’ve got a real story to tell that might just help others. And it’s not because it’s a ‘Where is me tale. It’s because I’ve learned so much.
Clive Branson 12:28
I’ve learned good things. I’ve learned things that help, that things that people told me that were completely incorrect. There was all sorts of conspiracy theories as to why I’d had a stroke, but ultimately they discovered that it was because I’ve got a hole in my heart, got to 37 and knew nothing about it. I’m sure you’ll understand this, but it transpires that you can have a defect in your heart from birth, two, three mil hole, and you’ll never know anything about it, but I don’t do anything by half. So mine was 12 mil. That’s how the clot had got through.
Volunteering and Mental Health Advocacy
Clive Branson 13:51
So I had heart surgery to close that. So, I’m summing up this really Bill to try and explain that. It was definitely the stroke everything else up to today that I now use to say to people ‘Hey, there’s two things here, one, you’re an awful lot stronger than you ever could imagine you were, and you can build on that. By the way, your the resilience you discover is not, that’s not it, you can build on that you can definitely overcome adversity, you really can, and you can adopt a positive mindset and you can maintain it. So that’s what I do.
Clive Branson 14:30
I volunteer up and down the country and for the prison service. On a voluntary basis, I speak to prisons, I speak to staff, to actively demonstrate these things that I’m articulating to you, and it’s a two way street Bill, because it’s so rewarding personally for me. Whenever I come back from one of these talks, I feel buoyed by the whole experience. So, that’s where I’m at today, and that’s how I view it.
Bill Gasiamis 15:02
I like the way you view it. So let’s unpack that a little bit, you talked about you hit rock bottom, it sounds like when you got to that stage where you needed treatment for your mental health. Was it inevitable, looking back, that you were always going to get there, and then when you got there, did you know that you were in a good place to come out of rock bottom?
Bill Gasiamis 15:31
Because I describe rock bottom as the place to start from, like it’s a new beginning, is the way I describe it. And I’m not saying that everyone’s journey to rock bottom is pleasant, or like mine, or anything like that, but it’s definitely if you flip what you see it as if you can’t get lower than where you are, then there’s only way, one way to go.
Clive Branson 15:59
Yeah, Bill, honestly, you’re speaking my language. We hear so much about the downside of trauma, but we don’t hear enough about the growth from trauma, and growth in terms of personal development and confidence and all these wonderful things can, without any shadow of a doubt, come from trauma, and that definitely was the case for me, and things that I’ve read and listened to and heard about your good self, I think that’s exactly the same as well. To answer your original part of the question, Bill.
Clive Branson 16:36
If you’d have said to any of my friends or colleagues, certainly, when in my professional career with the MOD, do you think Clive would be a candidate to have his mental health compromise that I said ‘You must be joking, Clive, you know, red hair, big mouth. You know, we’re the one we go to for problems, not a chance.
Clive Branson 16:54
But again, I can demonstrate that we’re not far away from having our mental health compromise, because life’s not easy, is it? None of us get an easy ride. So no, I and nobody around me would have ever thought that I would hit those levels and have the breakdown that I had.
Bill Gasiamis 17:17
Post traumatic growth. That’s the term, right? I didn’t know there was a word for the term when I was going through my periods of growth, and it’s post traumatic. Growth is not something that you potentially chase after. Not everyone knows that they’re going after it, they’re just doing it, and they’re not knowing, and there’s certain steps. My book is a book about post traumatic growth.
Bill Gasiamis 17:43
It’s 10 steps to get to the stage where you can say stroke was the best thing that happened to you, not from a medical perspective, from a personal development and growth perspective, because it gets you to a place where you don’t recognize yourself. Your identity is gone, everything you knew to be true is being questioned, your mortality is being questioned. You’re coming to terms with so many things. And of course, we’re not equipped to handle so much stuff, so in such a short amount of time, if we’ve never been there before, you don’t know how to navigate it, right?
Bill Gasiamis 18:22
So it’s like, well, everything shuts down. You go into a depression or a mental health state that you don’t recognize, that seems terrible at the time, because it’s terrible, however, it kind of has that opportunity, creates an opportunity for a reset to occur. And that’s the thing about that’s the thing about mental health issues that I kind of want to bring attention to, is that when you’re at rock bottom, if you’ve heard this before, you’ve reached rock bottom, yeah, then what I’m saying is it’s not the last destination.
Bill Gasiamis 19:02
It’s just a stop along the way to wherever you’re heading, right? And the mindset part that you mentioned, the a growth mindset, instead of a fixed mindset, it’s again, it’s a growth mindset is about, not actually forever feeling like you’re growing. It’s like a North Star, it’s having it in your priority. I’m going to do things that help me grow. Volunteering is a key criteria to help you grow. Volunteering is key. People don’t realize how important it is.
Bill Gasiamis 19:42
And then what happens is, as you have this growth mindset as your North Star, you’ll find days where it’s like stuff it I’m not doing this anymore. I don’t want to do this anymore. I’m not going to try anymore. You switch backwards to a negative mindset. The key there is to stay there for a short amount of time, just enough. It’s like that pity party that people talk about is just enough time have your pity party and then move on, and then just sort of start moving forward. What I love about volunteering is you’re making you’re doing it.
Bill Gasiamis 20:19
You’re doing something that’s not about you. You’re doing it about so you stop thinking about yourself, A, B, you get rewarded for making other people smile, feel better about themselves, have a conversation with you, etc. You’re you’ve changed your mindset from a it changes your mindset from a negative mindset to a growth mindset immediately, because you have to find a way to get out of the house. You have to find a way to get to the destination, to have the energy to talk to present, to do whatever it is that you’re going to do.
Bill Gasiamis 20:54
And then you’ve gotta find a way back. And then you gotta find a way to do it all over again in your worst time, in the time where you’re struggling, where everything’s terrible, and all of a sudden, when you’re doing that, and you’re in a space where there’s other people that need your support and need your help, what happens is you forget about all of your ailments and all of your dramas that you’re going through at the time. It’s just a wonderful thing that you can do for people. I think the reward back is far greater than the energy that you put out, that you have to.
Clive Branson 21:33
No question Bill, no question. I mean, you know, I’m fortunate enough to be on sort of some rosters, some speaker Bureau rosters. So I’m hoping that one day I’ll be able to provide for my family properly by doing that. And I work in the corporate world, and I’m growing that however I approached the prison service in this country, and it took me a while to do it, to get to the right person. It was LinkedIn, actually, that helped me, where one of the governors, you know, he realized he got a new stalker, and he said, I better respond to this guy.
Clive Branson 22:12
And he said ‘Look, come in, come to the prison and meet me. And, long story short, I said ‘Look, there’s no catch here, I’m not looking for anything at all, but I will come and I’m not learning from lines from textbooks. I’m not doing death by PowerPoint. I will share my story with brutal honesty, with it, with an injection of humor, but it will resonate, and I think that it can do some good, and it went from there. And you just get recommended from one prison to another, and you’re absolutely right in what you say. And as I say, I should have said to me 10 years ago.
Clive Branson 22:53
The benefits of volunteering. I made all the usual excuses not haven’t got time, you know this, to do something for someone or for a group of people, when there’s absolutely nothing in it for you. But then when you can get in your car and think, I’ve really done a good thing there. I know that sounds corny, but goodness me, it is a wonderful, wonderful thing, it really is. And yeah, and when you were talking there, Bill about the realization and the drive to do this and to get your direction back, I can remember when that happened to me.
The Power of Support in the Recovery of Clive Branson
Clive Branson 23:33
Because one of the biggest problems I had in terms of the mental challenges was because I’d completely lost perspective, you know, totally lost perspective, which I firmly believe that is one of our superpowers. I mean, it just is. I’d lost that, but it was my wife, and she was sitting across the table in the psychiatric hospital. I’ve been in there a couple of weeks. I was in there for 10 weeks in total, but I just recognized a Bill on this day, properly recognized her. And thought, wow, hang on a minute, that’s fake.
Clive Branson 24:08
You know, that’s the lady I’ve known since I was 12, and so she’s here amongst the noise, visiting a husband in the psychiatric hospital, but then she’s gotta go back in the car, go home, act really normal, and do all the mundane things, pay the bills, see to the children, etc, and then she’s got to get back in the car and visit me tomorrow with a smile on her face. And we’re a team. Now she needs me, and I definitely need her.
Clive Branson 24:39
And that’s the day perspective came back, and I just very, very, you know, just very slowly started to think, I need to sort of think about things. I need to consider where I am, and I need to build myself and get stronger. And that’s where it started. That’s where I got that’s where the growth, and certainly from a mental health point of view came from, it was wonderful.
Bill Gasiamis 25:06
Yeah, it reminds me of my journey after brain surgery. Same thing, you know, my father in law passed away just in November last year.
Clive Branson 25:17
Sorry to hear that.
Bill Gasiamis 25:18
Yeah, thank you. And 10 years ago to the same month his wife passed away, and that was during the same week that I got diagnosed with the third bleed, and was told that was sorry a week after I got diagnosed with the third bleed and I was told that I need brain surgery, so now my wife’s preparing a funeral with her sisters and her father to bury her mum.
Bill Gasiamis 25:45
And a week after that, I’m going into surgery for my brain, and then I’m in hospital for a month. And to me, her mother passing just completely goes out of my mind because, yeah, I’ve got other things to focus on and to worry about, right? Preoccupied, and I’m in hospital for a month and a bit, and she is doing all of the stuff you just described. She’s putting on a brave face coming to me going home, and probably, you know, doing the family stuff and putting on a brave face for them.
Bill Gasiamis 26:22
And probably not much time is spent on reflecting on her mother’s passing and what that means to her and how that’s impacted her family and all that type of stuff. It’s just life doesn’t end because you had a stroke, you have MND, you have prostate cancer? You had a heart attack, you had a hole in your heart. It doesn’t end. Everything continues, and you can’t just capitulate. You can’t just fall in a heap. I suppose you can do it for a short amount of time, while you’re resetting and you’re trying to wonder, which is the road I need to take out.
Bill Gasiamis 26:59
But it’s gotta be a short time now that might be days or months or weeks. It doesn’t matter, as long as over the span of your lifetime. It’s just a small window where you fell in a heap and you thought everything was, well, everything was sort of useless or helpless, or, I’m not sure what the word is and that’s what I find people who are sharing their stories on podcasts like this have done that. They’ve we all have similar steps that we’ve taken to get to that point.
Bill Gasiamis 27:32
And then sharing the stories also seems to be a bit of a a key ingredient to the next phase of your development and your growth. And I’ve had a lot of stroke survivors who will come on the podcast 5, 10, 20 years after the stroke, it’s still profoundly, unbelievably. Unbelievable to me that somebody still has to share a stroke story after 20 years like, it makes sense to me.
Bill Gasiamis 28:12
But it’s also really bizarre that stroke has that kind of a long lasting impact on people, and still, 20 years later, one day, jumped onto Google, did a Google search for stroke podcasts, found my podcast, and then thought ‘You know what? I think I need to jump on there and tell my story. Yeah, obviously the storytelling is part of the healing process as well.
Clive Branson 28:37
It says, yeah, no, it really isn’t you know your this platform that you’ve created, Bill, and the people that you’ve had on it, and obviously your wisdom and is a real eye opener. I learn an awful lot by listening to your episodes. It’s not just because it’s an interesting listen and actually it’s educational as well, and it clearly does an awful lot a great deal for the people that share their stories, and I am now one of them. So I really do sort of congratulate you on that, but no, you’re absolutely right.
Clive Branson 28:37
You know, it was without any doubt, shadow of a doubt, the first time that I ever had to sort of look at my own mortality. But I did it in such a way where I just thought ‘Wow, how lucky am I. How impossibly difficult, you know, that could have been so much worse for both me and my loved ones, and here I am. So it was definitely the start of it all, but touching on a little bit of what you said there, I believe, and sometimes, for some people, this is a little bit contentious, but I believe positivity is a choice Bill. Ultimately, we get a lot of advice.
Clive Branson 29:56
We get a lot of help. We listen to people like you, ultimately, the key to keeping that period of depression or feeling low to a minimum like you said, is because you have to accept it, you have to own it, and you have to make the decision ‘Okay, well, I can stay here and I can see what’s next, or what can I actually do to find myself again and find something completely different? If that mean, we all pivot in life.
Clive Branson 30:31
Sometimes we have to, and sometimes we want to, and there’s nothing wrong with that, and I suppose it links into the growth from trauma, but it’s definitely happened to me. No question about it.
Bill Gasiamis 30:43
Positivity is being able to answer this question, either answering it well or badly. It doesn’t matter, as long as you can answer it and it’s like ‘Okay, what’s good about this situation right now? And if you’re thinking is shallow, and you’re thinking ‘Okay, I’ve just been diagnosed with a stroke. There’s nothing good about this situation right now. Well, then there’s really hard to find a positive spin out of it, right or or even what’s funny about this right now?
Bill Gasiamis 31:12
If you know you’re like me and weird, you look at the funny things that happened in my medical, in my whole medical journey, and waiting for that, I was going home after my pre-surgery appointment. They do all the tests and scans, and they want to make sure that I’m ready for surgery, physically, and I had another episode. I don’t know what to describe it as, but I felt like really light headed, I was kind of out of this world. I was feeling strange sensations on my face and on my body.
Bill Gasiamis 31:56
And I thought I was having another bleed like in hospital while I was there. So we went to emergency. We were waiting there, and in that time, I’m really unwell and concerned about my health, my mother in law had just been buried a week earlier. I’m going into brain surgery in a week. And there was, I’ve shared this story before there was this kid who was on the spectrum somewhere, with autism somewhere there, and had been to the was a teenager had been to the toilet and come back.
Clive Branson 32:32
And was holding onto the armrest that I was holding onto. And we were kind of, you know, our hands were touching, or whatever. And his mom asked him ‘Did you wash your hands after you went to the toilet? And all of my stroke symptoms everything went away. Only thing I could do was focus on whether or not he had washed his hands. And I didn’t ask, and I didn’t respond anyway, strangely or whatever, I just got up and went to the toilet and washed my hands, and came and sat down.
Clive Branson 33:06
Oh, it’s wonderful.
Bill Gasiamis 33:07
Yeah, now there’s, you know, in amongst all the disaster that was my life at that moment, it really made me on reflection, it was a really funny moment. It made me completely overcome all of my stroke concerns and go and wash my hands and then come and sit back down and then resume my stroke problems. I mean, it’s weird, yeah, it’s about asking yourself that question. It’s like ‘Okay, what’s good about this right now? And that what’s good can be that I’m just, I’m in a hospital, and I’m being cared for.
Bill Gasiamis 33:46
Somebody is sitting next to me in the hospital who’s a friend, or whatever, like, that’s how you develop that focus on what’s good in this really terrible moment and distract yourself from the terrible moment, because sometimes focusing on the terrible moments at the wrong time is not good.
Bill Gasiamis 34:11
Because it could get your heart rate going in the wrong direction. It could get you stressed out, freaked out, and then that could make matters worse. So you want to be able to manage your condition, a little bit as much as you can. And that’s just one real quick, easy hack, that’s how you do it.
Clive Branson 34:33
Absolutely, yeah. I remember when I woke up in the hospital after the stroke, and obviously my wife was there, and we had a bit of a laugh and a joke quite quickly, really, because, bless her, she was desperate to say ‘You do know who I am, don’t you? You know it’s me, don’t you? And we laugh about it now, because it’s almost like a funny theme from a scene from a film where we don’t need to worry about diplomatic here. Do you know who I am? And you know, we laughed and joked.
Clive Branson 35:09
Obviously, I wished I’d have had the presence of mind to say ‘Who are you and I’d have milked it for a while, but obviously I just woken up. But yeah, these are funny little things that we talk about we reflect on and I touched on it earlier. I was aware very quickly that the guys and girls in this ward were had gotten a lot worse than I had. And that didn’t not from a gloating period. I felt grateful, I felt genuinely touched and grateful. I got on like a house on fire with the guy next to me, and we helped each other.
Clive Branson 35:48
And we, you know, his wife couldn’t get in as much as my wife could. So we sort of shared visits and things, and the humanity side of it, but I was desperate to get out and get back at it. But I think in life, Bill and you know, as a family, we respect humor. I think it’s wonderful thing, we all respect it. But let’s for example, with the MND, I didn’t want to make that a taboo subject for my loved ones or my friends. No, not because I’m that twisted and weird, but because I didn’t want them to worry.
Clive Branson – Prostate Cancer Diagnosis and Treatment
Clive Branson 36:37
I didn’t want them to tread on eggshells. I didn’t ever for them to feel that they’d said the wrong thing, and it stood us in good stead as a family, because if they want to talk about it, they can talk about it. If not, that’s great. And the prostate cancer is exactly the same. I’m only just now having treatment for that. I’m in the middle of having my external beam radiotherapy, and again, if they want to, if we had to open conversations about it, and that will continue. And I think that’s really important.
Bill Gasiamis 37:13
Yeah, I’m going to pause for a moment. I’m going to go grab a tissue when I come back, just so we don’t forget, which literally be in 30 seconds. I’m going to talk about, I want to talk about your, your MND diagnosis, how you came to notice that. I think it’s important about that. And then we’ll talk about your prostate diagnosis and how you came to know about that. There’ll be men listening, and I think we should share that.
Clive Branson 37:40
You go and do your thing, won’t be sick, I’m worried
Bill Gasiamis 39:10
I have morning allergies and my nose, it’s all runny.
Clive Branson 39:16
Yeah, I sometimes have hay fever through the through the summer. And to be honest, it’s some summers it’s not too bad, and others, it’s yet or there’s nothing worse.
Bill Gasiamis 39:28
And the allergies isn’t exactly what I have. So annoying anyhow. So I want to talk about how you came to become aware that there was another issue with your health, specifically about the MND. How do you notice that there’s something not right?
Clive Branson 39:53
Okay, yeah. Well, I was walking my youngest, Alfie, to school. So this is around about 2015 maybe 2016, and every now and again my ankle would just go really loose my left side, no pain at all. Just, you know, goodness me, I might go over on my ankle here, and you just think it’s nothing, a trap nerve or something, and you walk it off, but very slowly but surely, it became an issue from once a week to twice a week, just almost every other day. And I was banging my toe on things on a step or something like that.
Clive Branson 40:34
So I was seeing a neurologist, Bill about my headaches, and had been for quite some time. So I’ve been to the GP about this issue, about my ankle. So he instigated all the scans on my spine, my neck and all sorts of issues to make sure that there was no mechanical problem, trapped nerve, etc, until we got to the point where he said ‘Look, Clive, you’re already seeing your neurologist. I think you should mention it to him, because in my personal opinion, I think we might be looking at a neurological issue. So I did just that.
Clive Branson 41:15
And the neurologist said ‘Okay, Clive, and he needed, he did a few rudimental tests on the sort of push, pull muscle tests. But he said, I’m going to have to track the systems Clive. There’s no sort of quick, sort of answer to this. There’s nothing glaringly obvious.,I’m going to track it over a period of time, and while we do it, we’ll do well, what turned out to be every sort of test imaginable, really. And of course, what I didn’t understand or appreciate was they were eliminating all the various things that it could have been.
Clive Branson 41:45
But, yeah, scans, head, brain scans, nerve study tests, blood tests, all sorts of things. So we eventually got to the point where it was probably about 18 months where that’s a long time when you know you’re waiting for an answer or a headline or a name or something. So eventually, Bill, he said ‘Okay, Mr. Branson, I’m going to refer you to an Oxford Hospital, which is about two hours away from where I live. So I said ‘Okay, why? Why Oxford? And he said ‘Well, it’s the Center of Excellence for motor neurone disease. That was the first time that had been mentioned.
Clive Branson 42:26
But it did go over my head a little bit, but I did have the presence of mind to say, Okay, are you sending me there because you don’t know whether I’ve got MND, or is it because you think I have, at which point he said ‘Oh, it’s because I think you have. And you must understand that if you have there is no treatment, and I was out the door. Thankfully, the appointment for Oxford came through very quickly, certainly within 10 at the most, 14 days.
Clive Branson 42:53
So they’ve got all almost two years worth of evidence in front of them by this time, and they really are sort of leaders in their field to professors, and they looked at the evidence, and they did do a few rudimental tests similar what he’d done 18 months before, but it was the evidence that made the decision. They said ‘We’re sorry to tell you you’ve got sort of slow, progressive motor neuron disease. So I go there every sort of six to eight months, they track it.
Clive Branson 43:25
I now wear a splint on my left side for walking because it does the strength and the flexibility and the stability that the foot in the ankle and the calf should do. My left arms mildly weaker than my right and my core strengths, not great, but I’m doing really well, so much better than they ever imagined, to the point bill where last year I said ‘Is there any chance we can look at this diagnosis perhaps differently? Would you be prepared to repeat the tests that I had elsewhere? Would you do them here? And they agreed to do that, but it was just reaffirmed the diagnosis.
Clive Branson 44:12
But so an incredibly difficult time Bill, really difficult time to sort of process it to decide, how do we communicate it without doing some big announcement. But Vic does what Vic. She did what she does, and she did, you know, she took control and she spoke to people as and when it was appropriate. And like I said before, it’s not a taboo subject, so that’s how I discovered that one.
Bill Gasiamis 44:42
No, here I am again, straight into the laughter. It’s like, it’s that whole example of, like, nothing goes on hold because you had a stroke. Like, you’re not that special, that you can deal with it all on your own. Everything goes to on pause around you, and you know you’re going to have this perfect opportunity to deal with it. No shits going to get real, life’s going to continue to happen, and we it’s our responsibility to step up, gain the skills grow up beyond our 37 years and become a better version of ourselves to deal with the crap that’s coming down the pipeline.
Expect the Best, Prepare for the Worst: Prostate Cancer Awareness
Bill Gasiamis 45:30
Because there’s plenty to come we and there’s no choice you have to you gotta deal with it, and you gotta expect, I love this saying, expect the best, prepare for the worst. It’s great, isn’t it? Kind of what we’ve gotta do, right? So you’re dealing with that, you’re dealing with all the aftermath of stroke, and you’re also dealing with prostate cancer, stage three. How did you first notice that? And so the men that are listening should be aware of that, especially middle aged men.
Bill Gasiamis 46:10
I’m 50, anyone kind of from around the age of 40 onwards, needs to pay attention and understand the signs and potential symptoms of what prostate cancer feels like and how it impacts the body before, in the early stages. So give us a bit of an insight into that.
Clive Branson 46:35
Yeah, it’s a really important message, Bill, something I feel sort of really passionate about. So, so I’m my my son introduced me to the world of podcasts because I’m a bit of a technophobe. So I was, you know, I was starting to listen to sort of music that I hadn’t listened to before, but I was listening to podcasts, and I was some of them were slightly medical, etc. But nothing too deep, but just to expand my my awareness. But the one thing that was happening all the time was.
Clive Branson 47:05
When you’re approaching 50, you should probably get your PSA count checked, which thankfully, it’s not an uncomfortable physical examination in the in your GPS room anymore. It’s simply a blood test, which, it’s a bit ironic, Bill, because I am the biggest girls blouse when it comes to needles. I am woeful. But there you go. So I said to the doctor, my GP. I said ‘Look, I give blood regularly for the MND, etc. Is there anything can you? Can you add this count to the last the latest test? Which, of course, he did. So it was just a blood test.
Clive Branson 47:41
But I get a call a few days later and he said ‘Clive, your PSA count is so low it’s 3.2 now I believe the acceptable normal range is anywhere between one and four or I think so. Mine was okay, really, and I had no symptoms, nothing physical to be concerned about at all. This was just me feeling responsible because I was approaching 50 at the time, so but he said ‘I’m going to refer you anyway. And I don’t know really Bill whether the MND was in the back of his mind. I don’t know, but he referred me anyway. But so I saw a wonderful, wonderful consultant.
Clive Branson 48:24
And he looked at it, looked at it, and he listened, and he said ‘Clive, I would feel better if I could do an MRI scan, which he did. Went back to see him, Clive, I’d feel better if we did a biopsy test, which, again, okay, you just go with it, and then bang. He said ‘You’ve got stage two prostate cancer, so against no symptoms and and a PSA count. That wouldn’t alarm anybody. You wouldn’t relate it to it at all. So I’ve got prostate cancer, I got cancer on both sides of the prostate, but it was contained. I wanted the prostate taken out.
Clive Branson 49:06
But because of the MND, because the trajectory of the MND bill is it doesn’t change. So it’s individualistic, so if you’ve got it aggressively, it stays aggressive. And the tragedy is they cannot slow it down, but conversely, if it’s slow, it doesn’t speed up. However, to have the prostate removed, it’s quite an invasive operation, and it involves quite a number of muscle groups, and the thinking was that, because of the MND, the muscle groups might not bounce back as well as is in a healthy person, so they wouldn’t do it. So, long story short.
Clive Branson 49:43
We finally got to the point where the tumor’s grown. It’s showing signs of aggravating in my lymph nodes. So they said ‘Okay, let’s start hormone replacement therapy I’ve been on. That for three months, and I’ll be on that for two years, and I go for external beam radiotherapy. So it’s targeted radiotherapy, therapy beams that zap the tumor. Basically, I have to go to hospital every morning, 20 times, not Saturday and Sunday, but Monday to Friday, 20 visits. I’m only there for about an hour in total, and then the success rate is very good.
Clive Branson 50:35
And after about eight weeks, after it’s finished, I’ll have a consultation with an up to date scan where it will tell me that the tumor has been thrashed and it is no longer in existence.
Bill Gasiamis 50:50
Yeah, excellent. So is that procedure, that laser therapy procedure? Is that taxing? Do you then have a day of being quiet and relaxed and chilled out to get over that? How does it feel after it’s done?
Clive Branson 51:08
Yeah, good question. It’s nowhere near as bad as chemotherapy, which will be the next stage, if it hasn’t been quite as successful as we’re all hoping, but I’m sure it will be. But no, it tiredness and fatigue is the biggest downside to it. That’s all really so I do feel tired when I come home, and that will slightly increase as the treatment goes through those 20 days. But considering what they’re doing and how they’re doing it, it’s a small price to pay, in my personal opinion, and just in terms of awareness.
Clive Branson 51:45
There’s something else that’s available out there that, again, they wouldn’t do for me because of the MND, but it’s something that everybody should know about, and it seems that they don’t. And this treatment is called brachi therapy, and it’s a much smaller operation. It’s a one off, and they basically insert radioactive seeds into the prostate, and they kill the cancer off over a sort of 6 to 12 month period. You don’t have to have them, have them taken out, and the success rate is excellent.
Clive Branson 52:19
But I didn’t know anything about this. And as I speak to people and and try and spread awareness, I come across so many times where people think, what on earth that which was my reaction? So, you know, thank you for giving me the opportunity to sort of tell people about that Bill, because it should be much. It should be out there.
Bill Gasiamis 52:39
So there’s been a lot of really good sort of developments in treating prostate situations, whether it’s not cancerous or it is cancerous, and seems like they’re making really good progress in definitely making it less dramatic and traumatic for people going through it, and there’s a lot of prevention stuff that can be done. The PSA test is a blood test now, where previously was a rectal exam to your GP, and you had to somehow get over the idea that the GP would have to do a rectal exam, using a finger or whatever.
Bill Gasiamis 53:27
And feeling the prostate to sort of try and work out what condition it was in. And I imagine that wouldn’t be very accurate either. It certainly wouldn’t give people an insight into whether there was cells there or early stage cells or whatever. So there’s a lot of things that men can do. So all the men that are listening, who are maybe over the age of 40 or our age or older, have never had a PSA blood test done before. All they’ve gotta do is go to the GP during the regular checkup, and go ‘Can you please check my PSA also.
Mental Health and Personal Growth
Bill Gasiamis 54:05
If there’s any men noticing any difference with their erectile situation or just the way things feel down there, the way that it’s operating, whether the way that urine is being passed, etc, any situations like that, just go to the GP, start the process off as early as possible, because the sooner you get onto it, the better the outcome, and the more opportunities you have to treat it. And it’s not something that has to be, taboo anymore, because it was really taboo back in the day when men weren’t as willing, I suppose, to talk about that kind of stuff.
Bill Gasiamis 54:48
Or to think about that kind of stuff, or to attend to that kind of stuff, theyreally struggled to, perhaps, speak to their GP about it, and as a results, a lot of men didn’t get support, and that didn’t work out for them. So, yeah, really important now, with work and your career and all the things that you were doing, where is that? How are you keeping busy these days, other than lots of medical appointments to doctors.
Clive Branson 55:26
Yeah, I am a one man drain on the National Health Service here in England. Bill, I wear that with pride, I can’t deny that, but I’m slowly being confident enough to call myself an inspirational speaker now, Bill. And as I said before, I don’t hide the fact that I want to get to the point where I can provide for my family by doing that.
Clive Branson 55:54
But yeah, it’s more than that. I feel passionate about it, and I firmly believe, and the testimonials that I’ve received, they’re as positive and as humbling in equal measure, so they are landing, and it’s helping people so that, that’s my journey. Now, that’s my challenge, and I absolutely love it.
Bill Gasiamis 56:22
That’s great challenge, that’s my challenge right now. I want to transition from my full time job to also speaking more often and getting paid to speak. I’ve got a bit of a idea of what I want to talk about. Want to talk about post traumatic growth. I want to let people know that it exists so that people who find themselves in a terrible situation one day might go, I remember that guy spoke about that thing at that work function, that they, or I might look into that a little bit deeper.
Bill Gasiamis 56:56
And it’s more. It’s less about inspirational, because I know you use the word, but I know what you mean. It’s less about inspirational, it’s more about educational, isn’t it? It’s like, really, it’s about saying ‘Hey, if I can do it anyone can.
Clive Branson 57:13
Yeah, it really is, it’s as simple as that. I mean, I don’t I never use words ‘You know, I was broken or, you know, reframing words and putting positive spin on it is not as difficult, and sometimes we’re doing it without realizing it anyway. So, yeah, there is a lot of education in there. And it’s about encouraging people, empowering them, making them realize that if I can do it, you can do it. There was nothing, and there’s still nothing special about me, but the decisions I’ve made and the passion I’ve got to make it, so that’s all I need.
Clive Branson – Resilience, Connection, and Reinvention
Bill Gasiamis 57:58
What kind of role did you have at the Royal Air Force, and do you think the training that you went through and the career path that you followed, do you think that has held you in good stead for tackling this type of challenge?
Clive Branson 58:13
Absolutely, Bill, so I was only in the Royal Air Force for three years, and I was an armorer, I was an engineer, had a fantastic time. Absolutely, went in virtually straight from school, and yeah, best thing I ever did, but now, I spent 17 years in the Ministry of Defense within industrial relations. So I was involved with the trade unions, I was involved with senior HR from a sort of strategic level. So I could be in a one to one grievance.
Clive Branson 58:48
One day, I could be speaking to 300 people the next about, some things that the management, which we’re opposing to take proposing to take office. So that’s how I cut my teeth, in terms of learning to speak to people. That’s how I developed people skills. So yeah, is the short answer, it really did. It really did teach me how to connect with people. Because connecting with people is a privilege. You know, anybody can, sort of well, nearly anybody can get in, get up in front, and just speak or speak from a prompt or something.
Clive Branson 59:25
But to actually look people in the eye with with authenticity and passion and and connect with people, that is a privilege. And that’s something obviously you’re doing with your speaking, and that’s something that I’m hoping to do more of my my youngest son said to me, you’ll like this. Bill. He said ‘Dad, you need to be on Instagram. And I said, I’m 54 I don’t even know what Instagram means. And he said ‘No, no, you need to be on Instagram. So you know, this is a shameless sort of plug here, but I am on Instagram, Branson Clive.
Clive Branson 1:00:01
And you know, he’ll always say to me ‘Well, how many followers have you got Dad? And you know, it’s a bit of a competition there. So I’ve probably got about 30 followers. So perhaps that’s something that your listeners can help me out with, and yes, but he all on a serious note, he also put me on YouTube. And you know I really don’t know what I’m doing with it, Bill, and I don’t know where it’ll take me, but, you know, he’s opened it for me. It’s Clive’s Inspirational Hub, or no, it’s Clive’s Inspiration Hub, and I’m going to make use of it.
Clive Branson 1:00:37
And I’m going to put useful stuff up there. I hope people subscribe to that, because it is about education, it’s about awareness, it’s about sharing, and it’s about putting people at ease to think well, because sometimes the first stage is just asking somebody a question or sharing whatever it is that’s troubling you, and if they’ve got a platform to do it, which is something that you’re wonderfully providing, it’s sometimes the first step, isn’t it?
Bill Gasiamis 1:01:07
Yeah, I agree with that. I found out about YouTube in 2012 when it was still emerging. But in 2012 I had no idea what to do with it, either, so I just created a channel and just did nothing with it. Well, turns out, if I had started in 2012 this journey, you know, like literally two or three years into the whole YouTube experience, my channel could have been massive by now, but I didn’t have at the age of, say, 20 something, sorry, at the age of 37 I didn’t have a platform that I thought was, well, I didn’t have a platform. I had no idea what to talk about.
Bill Gasiamis 1:01:53
I was just busy doing the things I was doing, right? So I did nothing with it. And then in 2014 when I started the podcast and started putting out little bits and pieces of information and episodes again, I had no idea what I was doing, and I was just putting it out there, just so that I could have somewhere where I could store the information, that I was sharing with other people, as an easy way for for me to refer people back to it. If everyone, anyone ever asked, do you have information on this? And I could just say ‘Yeah, just fo there and there.
Bill Gasiamis 1:02:31
And because I was unwell, I was only putting up podcasts whenever I felt up to it, whenever I could do it. And that meant that it was sporadic and it wasn’t a lot of episodes, and it wasn’t consistent, and all that type of stuff so very difficult for people to catch on and for Google or YouTube to actually say you guys should follow this guy, and I just did my end of year review, which I always do at the end of the calendar year to check and see like where the podcast is at right.
Bill Gasiamis 1:03:06
So between 2014 when I first put out a first few videos that were not related to stroke, when I first put out my first few videos, to the beginning of last year. So the beginning of 2024 the channel had reached, it had done about 250,000 downloads. So people over that period of time had watched 250,000 times. And I thought that was fantastic, right? It’s excellent, it’s interesting. Is in the last 12 months, it has doubled, incredible. It went from 250,000 from 2014 all the way through to the beginning of 2024 and then in one year it doubled.
Clive Branson 1:03:58
So it’s incredible. Well done.
Bill Gasiamis 1:04:00
Yeah, it’s awesome, right? So, and that’s the thing is, I’ve got no control of that too much, because YouTube determines who’s going to get the views and all that type of thing. But what I’m finding is that people are interacting more, and they’re grateful for the stories, they’re grateful for the stroke survivors who have shared.
Bill Gasiamis 1:04:20
They’re leaving comments, they’re responding, and it’s become a community of like minded individuals who are looking at growth, looking at overcoming, who are looking at getting better, who are looking at, you know, moving beyond rock bottom. And, yeah, that’s what’s really cool about it, because I never expected that I would have a community of those types of people. Why I’m saying this is because, like, you doesn’t matter if you don’t know why you’re doing it when the coin drops and you know why you’re doing it.
Bill Gasiamis 1:04:52
Then you’ve already started, and you’ve overcome the technological hurdles, and you’re not so afraid of it, and then it’s just like. I’ll put that there, and if somebody wants to watch it, it’s up to them. That’s it’s the whole thing, it’s just like going into the prisons and talking. There’s was no nothing in it for me, then there is now, because now that it’s gained momentum, if I could twist that and turn that into a career or an income or something like that, then I’m serving myself and the community, yeah?
Bill Gasiamis 1:05:23
And it’s no better, it wouldn’t be a better way for me to have a career to serve the stroke community. I mean, that would be awesome, right? So that’s kind of my goal. That’s how it’s transitioning for me.
Clive Branson 1:05:36
Well, that you’ve cleared a long time, you’ve done some incredible work, Bill, and yeah, I mean, where if you’ve gone from 2014 on the 250,000 downloads, and all of a sudden, in the last 12 months, that’s doubled? That’s testament to the people you’re reaching. And yeah, the engagement and the awareness and the education, so long may it continue, and if we ever speak again, let’s hope it’s 5 million next time.
Bill Gasiamis 1:06:04
Well, I hope so too, mate. Well, as we wrap up, I want to ask you a couple of questions that I ask stroke survivors.
Clive Branson 1:06:13
Sure.
Bill Gasiamis 1:06:13
And normally, the questions are, what’s the hardest thing about stroke? I always leave that last bit stroke. But for you, there’s more than stroke, there’s other things. So I’m going to change the question a little bit to ‘What’s the hardest thing about your medical situations over the last few years? What was the hardest thing that sort of stands out for you?
Clive Branson 1:06:40
I think the hardest thing and this surprises people when we’re talking about MND and cancer and all the other things, the hardest and biggest challenge for me and my family has been when my mental health was compromised, and getting that mental health back to a place where I got perspective, back and I found the New Clive, the bit of the old and a bit of the new, that has been the hardest challenge. And I don’t want people to think that I’ve got it all sorted now, because we haven’t have we, that we still have to manage these things.
Clive Branson 1:07:17
We still have times where we feel vulnerable and we have to remind ourselves that we’re not the only person that’s feeling vulnerable. But it took me 54, years to realize, Bill, we have to live life on life’s terms. You know, we make plans and God laughs. So I accept that now with a smile on my face, but no, the answer to your question is, it was the mental health being compromised that was, and probably remains the biggest challenge.
Bill Gasiamis 1:07:47
Yeah, I love that you said that you you haven’t got it licked, like it’s still something that you have to manage, that’s exactly it, right? It’s that North Star. It’s North Star is always to bigger and better things, better mental health, better physical health, better emotional health. North Star, sometimes we’re not going to be there, and knowing that and addressing that and dealing with that and allowing yourself not to be there. That’s really important as well.
Bill Gasiamis 1:08:21
Yes, slightly different question, but similar in its nature. What’s something that you’ve learned in the last period of time that’s really been profound and shifted you into this new version of yourself, you know, this new what’s the word like into the wisdom that you have gained?
Clive Branson 1:08:48
Yeah, great question. Well I without doubt, look at life through a different lens now, and that touches on the growth from trauma. So I perhaps have learned not to sweat the small stuff so much. But there’s something that I hang on to almost daily, that I’ve learned, and that is that I love and I am loved. Now it’s not that long ago, Bill, I was far too big and cool to come out with a statement like that, but it’s true. I love and I am loved, and that kind of helps you not sweat the small stuff and just reminds yourself of what really matters in life.
Bill Gasiamis 1:09:48
I love that. It starts with ‘I love, because to receive love, you have to love and yeah, then it’s reciprocated. It’s just impossible not to reciprocate from the other side, and, you’re a typical British bloke, and you didn’t talk about that kind of stuff until the age of probably 50, or near 50 something, because you didn’t have to.
Bill Gasiamis 1:10:14
You didn’t show love with words, you showed it with, bravado and actions and things other than love, other than words, I know all about that, mate. I’m the same bloke on the other side of the planet, doing exactly the same things.
Clive Branson 1:10:32
Yeah. Well, good on you.
Bill Gasiamis 1:10:35
What do you want to leave the listeners with? Like, what’s, is there a message? Is there some kind of, I’m not sure what it is, you know, wisdom or something that you’d like to just impart on the people who are listening?
Clive Branson 1:10:53
Well, thank you for giving the opportunity to say that. Well, apart from my Instagram and YouTube details that, on a serious note, what I would really would like to leave them is, and I say this a lot, believe in yourself. Believe in yourself, because if you do genuinely believe, and it’s not about overconfidence or arrogance, but if you truly believe in yourself, that will be recognized, and people are far more likely to back you and support you if they’ve if that’s oozing out of your pause, so trust yourself a little bit.
Clive Branson 1:11:40
Learn the art of Self Compassion and believe in yourself, because, as I said before ‘You are a lot stronger than you could ever have imagined. So that would be what I would like to leave some of your wonderful listeners and people that watch it too.
Bill Gasiamis 1:11:58
That’s brilliant. I will ensure that everyone gets the opportunity to link to your Instagram and your YouTube. I’ll have those links in the show notes for anyone watching and listening go to recoveryafterstroke.com/episodes, to find those links. Also, if you’re watching on the YouTube channel, the links will be in the description, you’ll be able to go there and find that stuff.
Clive Branson 1:12:22
Thank you so much.
Bill Gasiamis 1:12:24
Yeah, my pleasure mate, thank you so much for joining me. I really appreciate it.
Clive Branson 1:12:28
Hey, listen, you’re doing wonderful things, Bill, and your story is just mind blowing. And perhaps one day I can flip this on you and I can ask you some questions about your story, because you’re a remarkable human being.
Bill Gasiamis 1:12:42
Anytime mate, it will be my pleasure. Thanks again for being on the podcast. That brings us to the end of this powerful episode with Clive Branson, from surviving a stroke at 37 to navigating life with MND and prostate cancer, Clive story is a testament to resilience perspective and the strength we can find even in the face of immense challenges, his dedication to helping others through speaking and advocacy is truly inspiring and probably at the center of why he’s doing so well.
Final Thoughts and Encouragement From Clive Branson
Bill Gasiamis 1:13:16
If today’s episode resonated with you, I’d love to hear from you, please leave a comment, like and subscribe on YouTube, and if you’re listening on Spotify or iTunes, a five star rating or review would mean the world to me, your feedback helps others discover the podcast and join our incredible community, and remember to check out my book The Unexpected Way That A Stroke Became The Best Thing That Happened, available on Amazon or at recoveryafterstroke.com/book.
Bill Gasiamis 1:13:47
And if you’d like to support the podcast directly, you can do so at patreon.com/recoveryafterstroke. And remember, even if you’re not in a position to support the show financially, simply listening to the podcast and not skipping the ads, goes a long way in helping keep this podcast running, every little bit helps. Thank you for being a part of this journey, your support and engagement keeps this podcast going strong, and I’ll see you in the next episode.
Intro 1:14:19
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