Michael Hendry is in the self-termed fight of his life.
He spoke to 1News from his home on Auckland's North Shore in the middle of two bouts of five-week courses of treatment for leukaemia - a cancer diagnosis he revealed on social media last night.
The Kiwi golfer has lost 13 kilograms already, but he’s determined to beat the “scourge” that has put his life on hold.
“So far the process is working and hopefully we can get through the other side of this without too many speed bumps and get back to life as normal, which is an exciting prospect," Hendry told 1News.
But this is already a significant speed bump.
Hendry was in some of the best form of his golfing career with four top-10 finishes this year alone, including one win, across the Japan, Asian and Australasian Tours. He had just completed tournaments in Hong Kong and Japan (finishing 2nd and T11), during which he didn’t feel right. He thought he was just rundown from playing so much. He went to his GP and that’s where everything changed.
“He was a bit concerned with some of the symptoms I had – not that he thought it was leukaemia at that point – but he sent me down to North Shore Hospital to get some tests and lo and behold I didn’t come home for five and a half weeks," he recalled.
“They sent me straight to Auckland Hospital, to the Motutapu Ward, and straight onto chemotherapy and there I stayed for five weeks. It was all a bit of a whirlwind and a bit of a shock, to be honest.”
The 43-year-old was hooked up to IV lines getting chemotherapy, blood platelets and transfusions as well as a lot of antibiotics.
“Those can be long days, you’ve got a long day of IV therapies, you’re pretty much bedridden because it’s hard to walk around a ward with a companion like an IV drip. So yeah, they can be pretty annoying and they can be quite hard work and they do knock you around a bit but, it’s part of the process, and one I’m willing to go through to get back to life as normal.”
He is adamant life will return to normal, he’s hoping for that as soon as September. But that’s not to say this isn’t hard and isn’t life threatening.
“It's been difficult,” he began. “One thing, I look back at my life and I’m pretty satisfied with what I’ve done in the time I’ve had. In terms of my own sort of feelings towards what this could lead to, I don’t have any regrets. The hardest thing for me is I haven’t fulfilled my responsibility as a father yet, my daughters are still pretty young so that is probably the most difficult thing emotionally to get through.”
But the outpouring of support from his friends, family and every day Kiwis is helping him get through.
“I really didn’t know that so many people cared so much and it’s been really overwhelming at times. It’s been really incredible actually, the amount of support that I’ve got from people.”
The golfers as well are getting behind him.
“Even though I only announced my health issues publicly yesterday, amongst the golfing fraternity the guys have known for a while and the level of support that I’ve had from all over the world has been unbelievable. Messages from people that I wouldn’t expect to get messages from, it’s been overwhelming.”
It may seem insignificant in the grand scheme of what’s ahead of him, but having to give up his spot in the 151st Open Championship at Royal Liverpool in July is one that’s been tough to fathom, especially considering the aforementioned form.
“It's disappointing, I was really looking forward to it and given the form I had been in this year, I’d given myself a pretty good chance of having a pretty good week. It is disappointing to miss out but my focus now is getting healthy and giving myself a chance to qualify again at some stage in the future.”
But, as well as being there for his daughters for years to come, golf is his other motivating factor to getting healthy again.
“I honestly think it’s very realistic, if I can get through this and come out the other side with a clean bill of health. I’ve got the support team around me to get me back to physically where I need to be to compete. Mentally I feel like I’m experienced enough and strong enough to get myself back to where I need to be to compete. To be perfectly honest, it’s the least of my concerns.
"I feel like as long as I can get through this and come out the other side healthy, I feel like that will come back and I’ll be able to do what I want to do on the golf course again and I think this will potentially make me stronger mentally as well if I can get through the other side of it.”
For now it’s lots of rest and eating to get stronger as he faces another round of chemotherapy in a couple of weeks time.
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