Stephen Webb: 'It's daft to give up in face of hopeless scenario'
A Leicestershire dad diagnosed with a brain tumour has said he wants to tell people who are struggling that it would be “daft” to “give up” in the face of what might seem like a “hopeless situation”. Stephen Webb suffered a seizure in August while in his living room, and was rushed to hospital later that evening.
In his latest video update, uploaded online on Thursday (October 10), the English teacher, from Burbage, near Hinckley, said he is waiting for a report on a biopsy - a piece of tissue taken for analysis - following brain surgery. Reflecting on his health battle so far, he said in the YouTube video: “This stoicism thing is very important to me, and I think it can do a lot to help people."
Stephen said that while there were "lots of different things" a stoical approach to life could help with, the "biggest thing" he wanted to tell people - especially people in a situation that feels "hopeless" - was not to give up. He said that approaching such situations thinking, "Well, what’s the point, you might as well give up, there’s nothing you can do" was "a backwards way of looking at things, because the idea within stoicism is that you give your power to the fact that things happen externally that you have no option, no control over.
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"It’s beyond your control, there’s nothing you can do and it's very easy to give in and to give up to those things, and to allow these things to just happen to you." More helpful, he said, was to remember that "you have control over your own opinion, of how to react to things". He added: "Even if you can’t do this, this and this, these 25 different things, you can still make positive decisions and wrestle back control over what looks like a hopeless situation, and forget the things there is nothing you can do about [...].
“Okay, what can you continue to do? Well, if that means research for things, brilliant. If that means you go out for a lovely walk... I’ve got control over these things, and I’ve got control not to just give up - it just seems daft.”
Hailed as an “incredibly inspirational” teacher by staff at his workplace, Hastings High School, the dad-of-two is currently waiting for a report after his brain surgery in September. Stephen said the family had received a "short version" of the report, which "confirmed the glioblastoma", but that the full report would specify which type of glioblastoma he has, and that information in turn would "affect lots of things down the line". "It will affect slightly the type of chemotherapy, and none of these plans can be started until we get this report.” Once the type of tumour is known, Stephen will undergo radiotherapy and chemotherapy simultaneously for six weeks.
For five days a week in hospital he will have radiotherapy, and will undergo chemotherapy seven days a week. He said that was “likely” to start within the next two or three weeks.
Stephen is also hoping to undergo possible life-extending immunotherapy treatment, which people across Leicestershire have supported by rallying around Stephen and his young family, including children Noah, 11, and Scout, nine, to raise more than £170,000 to help fund the procedure. He said that because of the “incredible” amount of money that had been raised over the past month, immunotherapy treatment gave him “options”, adding that there were plenty of “moving parts” to his possible treatment journey which would need to be considered.
Speaking of the effect the brain surgery had had on him, Stephen said: “You may hear my voice is starting to get a bit better. The [affected] part of the brain - it has taken a big whacking as part of the operation. It's trauma, I suppose is how it is explained. So therefore it will be a bit swollen. That’s why the speech is slightly affected, as well as other things." He said his reading and writing had also been affected.
He also told viewers that he had been in touch with other people in a similar position to his, and that they had learned that there was "very little" research about "how to stop this thing". He said: “Overall, the thing I wanted to share, I am realising there is a whole little niche world of people that are in our position. They are reaching out, and we are reaching out, to other people who have got this very unique story.
"We realised as you start researching there is very little in terms of what we are learning about how to stop this thing. But actually it seems at least like there is gathering a bit of momentum, that people noticed this is a problem that needs to be sorted.
"Because for people like me and obviously it affected my family and this whole community in this sort of way, it's our problem, it's not my problem, it’s everybody’s problem.”
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