How Hong Kong bone cancer survivor overcame illness and divorce to be stronger than ever

Douglas Bray has overcome more challenges than most of us in the last four years.

The Hong Kong business owner was diagnosed with a rare type of cancer in September 2021. Three months later, he and his wife separated. A few weeks after that, he was in a scooter accident and suffered a serious tear in the anterior cruciate ligament in his knee.

Here is how, after hitting rock bottom, Bray took charge of his physical and mental health and underwent a transformation to compete in daunting athletic challenges.

Bray, who grew up in Brisbane, Australia, has called Hong Kong home since 2010. In August 2021, he fell during a tennis lesson after he felt a sharp pain in his left leg. Several scans revealed an abnormal bone growth in his hip and a large lesion on his pelvic bone. A biopsy found it to be chondrosarcoma, a rare form of bone cancer.

“I was in shock. I suddenly had to confront my mortality in a way I never had before,” says the 38-year-old, who had had many benign tumours – known as osteochondromas – on the surface of his bones when he was growing up.

He had several of them removed, from his shoulder at age 8, his scapula at age 10 and his knee at age 27.