Doug Cockle, the voice of Geralt of Rivia in The Witcher series, has shared that testing and talking about cancer is “so important” for helping more men address their health.
Cockle announced that he had been diagnosed with prostate cancer in June while sharing Prostate Cancer UK’s online risk checker for the condition. “I had no symptoms, no pain, nothing I could point to in my body that was telling me that I have prostate cancer,” he explained in an interview with IGN. “In that sense my diagnosis was a big surprise.”
I had no idea. Random check and Boom… I have full blown prostate cancer. Treatment ongoing but looking good so far. Men over 50… get a PSA test… just in case. 🙂❤️ More info at @ProstateUK #MensHealth #health #prostatecancerawareness #prostatehealth https://t.co/HFItTImvU2
— Doug Cockle 🐺⚔️🧸 (@DCockle) June 6, 2023
He said that, while he does have a family history of cancer, it was a documentary that reminded the actor to go get tested. “I guess I knew it was a possibility, but to be told that, yes, I have prostate cancer, was still a surprise,” continued Cockle, recalling how he found a connection between an interviewee in the documentary who had lower back pain and his own mild sciatica. “It’s that old thing, you know, [it] won’t happen to me.”
“Knowledge is power,” said Cockle of the importance of testing and sharing each others’ experiences with the disease. “The knowledge that something isn’t right can lead to discomfort and pain and we don’t want that… Hopefully, I’ve got many years left in which to enjoy my life with my family and friends,” he said.
Cockle’s cancer was “pretty well advanced” when the doctors diagnosed him. Had he put off testing, there might have been fewer options for him. “Talking about these things means that others might hear and act for themselves or those they care about,” he explained.
He had worried about the response from fans when he revealed his health status on social media, however, he was inundated with support from all four corners of the world.
“When the Prostate Cancer UK tweet showed up in my Twitter feed it just felt right. If I retweeted this, I wouldn’t so much be talking about myself as talking to and about all of us men. My own diagnosis wasn’t really the point; it was the context to spread the word,” he said of the “overwhelmingly positive” messages he and his family received.
In other gaming news, Microsoft extended its deadline for its potential acquisition of Activision to October in an effort to win over the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority.