Matt Ticehurst, 34, died from a grade 4 astrocytoma in January 2026. He first realised something was wrong four years earlier when he suffered a focal seizure while on holiday. The seizures continued when he returned to the UK, and an MRI scan revealed the tumour on his brain. Matt had two awake craniotomies, followed by chemotherapy and radiotherapy. After 18 months of stable MRI scans, Matt learned he had two new tumours and turned to private immunotherapy in Germany, having exhausted all treatment options on the NHS. Matt was highly regarded among his work colleagues and they were inspired to do a 26km walk to raise money for Brain Tumour Research in his memory.
Matt’s wife, Kirsty, tells his story…
In February 2022, Matt suffered a focal seizure while we were on a skiing holiday in France.
He didn't know it was a seizure when it happened, but he was feeling really sick and his right-hand side was numb. The seizure lasted for around five minutes, but then it kept happening throughout the day and even on our flight home.
When we returned to the UK, Matt had his annual health check which came back perfectly normal and said he was really healthy - but he continued having focal seizures pretty much every day.
Matt was a very fit man and he ran to work all the time, but he had to keep stopping on his runs because of the seizures.
After six weeks, Matt went to see a doctor and, through his health insurance, got referred for blood tests. He wore an ECG for a week to monitor his heart, but all the tests came back normal.
It wasn't until the end of May when he had an MRI scan which showed a huge six-centimetre aggressive brain tumour in his head.
It was a huge shock and we were devastated with the news, however Matt made it really difficult for me to be that upset because he had such a good attitude about it. Matt was the sort of person who just cracked on with life and I figured if he could have that outlook, then I should too.
The neurologist put Matt on steroids immediately, and he was referred for surgery.
Matt’s attitude was typical of him; he said it was OK, bad things happen to people all the time, and he just got on with things. This set the precedent of Matt’s attitude throughout the entirety of his illness.
The next day, we were supposed to go to watch the rugby sevens at Twickenham with our friends. We got up, went and got the steroids, and went to Twickenham. Matt said: “Let's just spend five minutes telling everyone and then let's just try and have a nice day”. It just summed him up.
Matt had surgery at Charing Cross Hospital in London. He needed to have an awake craniotomy because the tumour was deep, near his brainstem, and the areas responsible for the speech, language and short-term memory. He was so calm and did so well.
A couple of days after surgery, Matt couldn't talk. We were told it was probably temporary, but it went on for a few days.
They had to keep scanning him because his brain swelled up quite a lot.
It took a good three to four weeks for his speech to come back properly.
It was stressful. Even though I was 95% sure it would reverse, it's just horrible watching someone struggle.
In August, Matt had the standard of care approach you do with high grade brain tumours, which is radiotherapy with temozolomide chemotherapy. He agreed to also have lomustine which is derived from the same chemical family as mustard gas. Matt had six-weekly cycles of that for nine months.
It’s really toxic and it absolutely slammed his immune system.
He did have a few rounds that were delayed by a few weeks because his bone marrow wasn’t great, but he was an absolute trooper.
Throughout that year, he had seven stag dos and nine weddings, and he went to every single one of them. I remember us going from a really early radiotherapy session and then driving out to a wedding. He wasn't missing anything, but it did absolutely knock the beans out of him. I remember the days where he was on radiotherapy, even standing up to get a glass of water would knock him for the next two hours and he’d have to lie down.
I had to cook really bland food - no onions, no garlic - and lots of mashed potato. He lost so much weight while having the treatment.
As soon as Matt was coordinated enough to start running again, he started really slowly doing half a kilometre and gradually building up. By the time of his last chemotherapy cycle in 2023, he ran the Bath Half Marathon, which is crazy.
In 2024, Matt did the London Marathon in just over four hours, raising £25,000 for Brain Tumour Research. He was truly inspirational.
In February 2025, after 18 months of stable MRI scans, Matt suffered a seizure on a flight home from his own stag-do in Lisbon. Upon landing, he was taken to Charing Cross Hospital in London where a scan confirmed his cancer had returned in the form of two tumours in his brain.
Matt needed to have a second awake craniotomy. He unfortunately ended up with a long recovery period, in and out of hospital due to a cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) leak. It was unfortunate timing, with our planned wedding date in May, however we still managed to have a beautiful smaller ceremony in Weybridge with close friends and family.
We invited as many people as we could to the registry office. It was so gorgeous. I don't think either of us had ever felt happier.
Matt was the absolute love of my life. I’m so glad I got to marry him.
After Matt’s second craniotomy he did unfortunately struggle with facial recognition and remembering names.
By July 2025, Matt was already having seizures again. A scan showed he already had two tumours which were at opposite ends of his brain, and both were inoperable. It was the moment we knew we were now looking at Matt being unlikely to make it to Christmas, which was tough.
In classic Matt fashion, he carried on as normal, doing everything he could to stay fit and healthy whilst he was on chemotherapy
Due to chemotherapy being unlikely to work for a recurrent tumour we did a huge fundraiser, and we started flying out to Germany every month to try some immunotherapy.
We travelled to Germany one week every month. Unfortunately, the treatment sometimes made him really ill and the travelling was tiring.
One positive was that Matt’s family members flew out for some of the trips, and it meant there were chunks of time spent with his mum, dad and brother as well over this period. It offered a glimmer of hope, but by November he was really too ill to travel. We made it work and even got him out for one last round in December using wheelchairs in the airports when needed. Matt’s determination to live really shone through in this period.
We’re so grateful for all the treatment and care that Matt received on the NHS but it's frustrating there aren’t more options in the UK.
I do think the hospitals are doing as much as they can with the resources they have, but the government funding for research into brain tumours is so low in comparison to other cancers, even though it’s the largest killer of younger people. Brain Tumour Research is striving to change this and my hope for other families facing a diagnosis is that there will be more funding and more options available in the UK soon.
Matt had a scan in September which showed he had seven tumours in his brain. By that point, he was forgetting my name.
Matt loved his life so much. I don't think him fighting was necessarily ever because he was really scared of dying. I think he just loved being alive so much.
He just wanted to put all his energy and everything into doing everything he could to keep that going.
Matt had to come off the temozolomide because it clearly wasn’t working. He was quite confused at times and had short-term memory issues. I think it was very challenging for him, but he was never bitter about it.
Brain cancer strips every single part of you - each day something else would go - whether it's that he couldn't talk or he couldn't move another limb. But he was still the most chipper and loving man. Sometimes he'd barely say anything all day, and then he'd crack a joke over Christmas.
He was an absolute angel, from the day he got diagnosed to the day he died. He never ever gave up and was so unconditionally selfless.
Even in his darkest days, he was always loving and being silly. He worried about us – not himself. I'm so proud of him for carrying on trying to fight.
I was holding Matt when he died in our home on 13th January 2026. It was during an episode of Peep Show which was quite funny because David Mitchell’s character, Mark Corrigan, was blaring out of the TV and I couldn't find the TV remote to turn it off. Matt would have found that so funny.
Matt worked at Related Argent, a property developer in London. Over the last four years, the company has held an annual walk to raise money for charity. Matt did two of them; one when he was on chemotherapy. This year, the company wanted to raise money for Brain Tumour Research in Matt’s memory.
On 11th June, I joined 120 of Matt’s Related Argent colleagues for a 26km walk through London which set off from the company’s head office in King’s Cross.
What Related Argent is doing is wonderful. Brain cancer is such a devastating disease, and grief for those affected can feel incredibly lonely at times. It’s really wonderful to see how highly Matt was regarded by his colleagues.
It was a fantastic day to all be together and to do something for a great cause.
Matt was deeply grateful for all of the support Related Argent gave him throughout his diagnosis and subsequent return to work. He really liked his job and seeing his colleagues in the office. He was always incredibly fond of everyone he worked with, both at Related Argent and previously at Deloitte.
What happened to Matt was just so devastatingly awful but he will never be forgotten.
It's so lovely all this money is being raised to fund research into brain tumours. It is such an honour for Matt, and it warms my heart.
Kirsty Maund
June 2026
One in three people in the UK knows someone affected by a brain tumour. This disease is indiscriminate; it can affect anyone at any age. What’s more, brain tumours continue to kill more children and adults under the age of 40 than any other cancer yet, to date, just 1% of the national spend on cancer research has been allocated to this devastating disease since records began in 2002.
Brain Tumour Research is determined to change this.
If you have been touched by Matt’s story, you may like to make a donation via www.braintumourresearch.org/donate or leave a gift in your will via www.braintumourresearch.org/legacy
Together we will find a cure.
