Rhod Gilbert high on life after cancer treatment

Rhod Gilbert says he feels better than at any other time in his life

Comedian Rhod Gilbert says "waking up every morning is exciting" after receiving treatment for cancer.

He was diagnosed with head and neck cancer in June 2022 and underwent chemotherapy and radiotherapy at Velindre Cancer Centre in Cardiff.

He received his first clear scan in October and said "life is sweet".

"Honestly I'm wonderful," he said. "This sounds absurd because as any cancer patient will tell you, it's a new normal.

"Things are never quite the same again, but I sort of feel better than I've ever done in my life," he told Lucy Owen on BBC Radio Wales.

He said everything seemed "a bit heightened, a bit sweeter" and a "bit more important", adding: "I feel everything a bit more keenly, so waking up every morning is exciting."

Gilbert was a patron of Velindre, a specialist centre for non-surgical cancer patients in south-east Wales, for 10 years before his diagnosis.

It was on a fundraising trek for the centre's charity he first became aware of the lump on his neck.

"What's great about my story is it just lends itself to stand up," he said.

"I don't even need to turn them into jokes.

"I've been a patron of Velindre for 10 years. I'm leading a fundraising trek through Cuba when I catch cancer. I leave as a patron, come back as a patient.

"And then I've got to have chemotherapy in a room with a picture of me on the wall. It's just like... you can't make it up. It's just hilarious."

Gilbert said he owed his life to the charity and was determined to keep raising as much money as he can with a trek to Morocco in July and Patagonia next year.

"I keep saying I'm lucky and I keep thinking 'it's not luck it's Velindre. It's the skill of my doctors and the cancer hospital where I was treated'."

Rhod Gilbert recently took part in Channel 4's Celebrity Bake Off for Stand Up To Cancer

Over the next two years, Gilbert will be touring his new show Rhod Gilbert and the Giant Grapefruit - a nod to both Roald Dahl's James and the Giant Peach, and the tumour in his neck.

Not having known if he would be able to work again, he said the tour felt like a dream.

"To be on stage now, doing full pelt doing big shows in big theatres about what's happened, I have to pinch myself every night on stage."

He said he wanted to give people hope by turning cancer into comedy.

"It's a line I'm walking you know, it's not the easiest line to walk because I'm very aware that out in my audience, there's lots of people with cancer, or have been through cancer, or are about to start treatment.

"There's people with families and loved ones... so I've had to find my way a little bit with it to get this sort of tone right.

"But I think, judging from the reactions I'm getting, and the people who call out to me in the audience, and tell me their stories, and the emails I'm getting after, and the people waiting at the stage door after to tell me their stories, I've got a feeling that I think I'm getting it about right."

Gilbert said he still had a few "niggly" problems that might be expected after his "brutal" treatment, but said he wanted to make the most of every opportunity that comes his way.

You can listen to Lucy Owen's full interview with Rhod Gilbert from 15:00 BST on Saturday 4 May and afterwards on BBC Sounds