JENI O’DOWD: Rohan, a retiree with terminal cancer, shows us that contemplating death can help us live better

Lately, I’ve been thinking a lot about a man I don’t really know.

Rohan, 65, is a friend of my husband’s, the type of person you meet and instantly like.

Four years ago, he was diagnosed with stage four prostate cancer. It had already spread to his bones. Terminal.

Many people, when they hear that, cling to what they know: their home, their routine and sense of control.

But Rohan, a retired airline pilot, did the opposite. He sold everything, including his apartment, and gave away his beloved grey Burmese cat, Maeve. He then got on his yacht and sailed north.

“I thought, OK, I’ve now got the biggest challenge of my life. And I’m going to meet it,” Rohan told me.

There was no “I’m going to beat this”. No slogans. No bravado.

From the beginning, he said he accepted he was dying from cancer, and then got on with living.

Rohan’s days are simple. Sailing. Swimming. Long stretches at sea. Weeks in the bush when cyclone season hits. He takes friends with him when he sails and never seems to be alone. He returns to Sydney only for doctors’ appointments and medication.

“I’ve never been happier,” he said. Repeatedly. As if he still can’t quite believe it himself.

There are thousands of people like Rohan across Australia. You just don’t hear about them, because they’re not famous, not especially glamorous, and their lives don’t come packaged as tragedy.

Prostate cancer is the most commonly diagnosed cancer in Australian men, with about 29,000 cases expected this year alone. Nearly 4000 will die from it, according to Australian Institute of Health and Welfare projections.

However, more Australians are living longer with serious diagnoses than ever before, as treatments improve and the population ages.

Population ageing is now “a key force reshaping Australia’s economy”, says the latest federal data, with the number of people aged over 85 expected to more than triple in the coming decades.

Which means, increasingly, more of us will find ourselves facing not just how we die, but how we choose to live in the years leading up to it.

When Rohan was first diagnosed, his doctors told him they’d be disappointed if they couldn’t give him three to four more years. He’s now at four and a half.

They also think his lifestyle has helped lengthen those years. Less stress. More movement. Better food. Space.

Rohan thinks so, too. “I just didn’t want all that clutter,” he said.

That line stayed with me longer than I expected, because most of us are surrounded by it.

Not just physical clutter, but the kind that fills our days. Work we don’t question. Routines we don’t break. Plans we keep pushing out. People we see because we feel obligated.

We tell ourselves we’ll change things later, travel later, slow down later, have a baby later.

It’s always about later, as if time is something we can schedule.

Rohan says if he hadn’t been diagnosed, he’d probably still be working. Still living in his suburban flat with only his cat for company, and going to the local pub a few nights a week.

“There is a lot to like about cancer,” he told me at one point, almost casually.

It sounds shocking until he explains it. “It crystallises the brain. Suddenly, you become acutely aware of what is important.”

But, of course, it’s not that simple. There’s Rohan’s son, 30, who is his only real source of worry in all of this.

Rohan doesn’t talk about himself much when it comes to the end. He talks about his son.

There is fatigue now, and he’s not eating much — quiet signs that the disease is catching up.

His doctors can’t say how long. Just that he’s done better than expected.

“Time’s nearly up,” he says, without drama. And yet he’s not afraid of it.

“I’ve had five years of a time that I’d never thought I would,” he said. “Not many people get to write the script for the twilight years of their life.

“If I could go back to before my diagnosis, and I’m standing at a road that splits in two, one path is cancer, and the other is no cancer…what choice would I make?

“I’m very adamant about this. I wouldn’t change that road because the last five years of my life have been so rich and fulfilling.

“I nailed it.”