Dad’s aches and pains turns out to be terminal cancer

By Jack Fifield

A builder who went to the doctor with back pain has been given just years to live after he was diagnosed with stage 4 prostate cancer.

Grant Learmont, 40, has cycled from Lands’ End to John O’Groats, runs half marathons, plays football, and owns his own builder’s business.

So when the dad-of-two went to doctors on January 5 with a stiff back and hips he put it down to ‘aches and pains’.

He said: “The doctor, as along with me, thought it was maybe just muscular in my back – with my building and football.

“We both thought it was muscular, it made sense. She made me an appointment with the physio.”

Two-and-a-half weeks later, Grant, from Dumfries, Scotland, went to the physiotherapist and was given exercises.

But by early February, the pain had shifted from his lower back and hips towards his shoulder and chest.

Grant said: “If I was sitting up in bed, or I took a big deep breath in, it was really sore, so I ended up phoning the doctor back.”

Later that night, he received a phone call from the GP saying they’d found ‘abnormalities’ in his blood and that he could have a blood clot.

Grant was given a hospital appointment the next morning, on Valentine’s Day, to get a CT scan.

By that evening, after having a dinner date with his wife in the hospital canteen, he got the dreadful news.

Shadows in his spine, pelvis, and left hip indicated metastatic bone disease from incurable stage four advanced metastatic prostate cancer.

Grant said: “When he told me ‘extensive bone disease’, I was like ‘right, OK’, but when he said it had led on from prostate cancer I thought ‘what?’

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“I was totally confused, I had absolutely no symptoms – going to the toilet has been absolutely fine, any other symptom – not a thing.

“Just a slight bit of pain in the weeks leading up to it, and that was it.”

Doctors have since given Grant a testosterone blocking hormone injection to stop the hormone from fuelling the cancer, but further scans showed the cancer was even more extensive than previously thought – appearing in his collarbones, ribs, and sternum.

He’ll now be starting "triplet therapy" consisting of a hormone injection, oral hormones, and chemotherapy starting in mid-April.

Doctors have said Grant could live for another four to 10 years, but they are uncertain.

Grant said: “They don’t know – it’s a needle in a haystack.”

Now, Grant, alongside his wife Kirsten, daughter Tilly, 19, and son Shaw, 17, are raising money for prostate cancer charities by taking part in the 56.7-mile long (91.2-km) ‘Tour de 4’ charity cycle through the Scottish countryside.

Set up by former track cyclist Sir Chris Hoy, who was diagnosed with stage four prostate cancer in 2023, the ride will take place in Glasgow this September – with riders tackling 3,830 ft (1,167 m) of elevation.

The family, as well as some family and friends, has already raised more than $10,000 in donations.

Grant said: “My wife’s been amazing – she’s been there by my side throughout my tests.

“I want to raise awareness and raise money, to show people – for years this has been seen as a disease that older people get, in their 60s and 70s.

“I’m proof in the pudding it can happen to younger people.

“Especially because I’m in the building trade, loads of builders and joiners are always moaning about aches and pains.

“I want to raise awareness – if you’ve got a constant pain or you’re feeling sore, go and get checked out.

“We want to raise as much money as we can towards prostate cancer.”