Hiya, and festive greetings.  Welcome to the final episode of 2015 and it only seems right to end the year with your stories. It’s been such a privilege hearing from you as ultimately if we can hear each other share what we’ve been through it helps, doesn’t it? For this podcast, I was keen to know how you deal with work during treatment.

Personally, I struggled with who to tell. We found out we need treatment, the day before Christmas Eve 2013, so the holiday was spent trying to work out how I was going to manage at work with what was ahead. I was working as a freelance so didn’t have the direct access to HR you might have, plus I was in a male-dominated environment and felt quite strongly that I shouldn’t need to tell my boss I was ‘trying to have a baby as in a normal situation I would just tell him I was pregnant when the time was right.

I did however go to HR and get some advice and after discussions with my partner, I chose to tell my boss I was having medical treatment I explained this meant I would have to take a certain amount of days off, and that there could be an occasion where it was at very short notice. The nature of my job meant that I had to tell my immediate team, as I was working in a live radio environment and we needed to prepare for me not being there, but they were very understanding, and to be honest so was my boss.

I think the biggest lesson I learned and that comes across from my chats with you, is put yourself first and do what feels right to you.

Items mentioned in this podcast:

• Having a family is a ‘life goal’ so important to focus on the treatment
• Having to go from appointments where you might have had bad news to a work meeting
• Not doing either thing well – your treatment or your job
• Taking a sabbatical and giving yourself headspace
• Dealing with Male infertility and finding the lack of information on what to do about it frustrating

@GeoffLloyd on Absolute Radio sharing his news with his team and his listeners