'Cancer doesn't define me. How I respond to it defines me.' - Dai Henwood speaks about incurable cancer diagnosis. Video / Newshub
Comedian Dai Henwood has revealed he is suffering from Stage 4 bowel cancer, and that it is not curable.
44-year-old Henwood says he was diagnosed with the disease during the Covid-19 lockdowns in April 2020.
The cancer started in his bowel and moved onto his liver. He was hopeful for a positive prognosis, although it had since spread to his lungs and lymph nodes.
The 7 Days and Project host says he's been 'working, laughing and loving life', in spite of his diagnosis.
“My love and skill is bringing [happiness and making people laugh].” he said in a video on Instagram.
"The universe doesn't have fair and unfair - it has events. And how you respond to the event defines you, not the event," Henwood said.
Henwood has been through fourteen rounds of chemotherapy, high-dose radiation, three lung surgeries and having parts of his bowel and liver removed, he's currently in a break from treatment.
"Right now I thought it was time to be public with my diagnosis," Henwood said.
"I'm an authentic person and it was such a huge part of my life that I was hiding."
Henwood burst onto stage and screen in the late 1990s as a stand-up comic and went on to host TV Shows The Project, Dancing with the Stars, 7 Days, Family Feud, the annual Vodafone Music Awards, and much more.
The son of actor Ray Henwood, he won the Billy T Award in 2002.
In an interview with friend and fellow comedian Jacqui Brown, Henwood said “this is now such a big part of my life... I just felt I needed to be honest about where I’m at”.
“I’ve made a conscious decision not to suffer. Cancer doesn't define me. How I respond to it defines me.”
