Mat Dean: Mind Over Muscle

26 May, 2026

As a bodybuilder, Mat Dean was used to putting his body to the test. But nothing prepared him for the onslaught of health issues he has endured over the past several years. Physical fitness definitely helped, but a strong mental attitude was arguably his greatest secret weapon.

“From about the age of 20, as a smaller-framed guy, I always wanted to bigger and better myself,” Mat Dean tells me early on in our video call. Even though he is sitting in his car throughout our conversation, it is easy to see he has achieved this goal.

Now 42 years old, Mat has dedicated much of the past 20 years to either weight-lifting or bodybuilding competitions. Stacked, broad-shouldered, and sporting a large, thick beard, Mat is the type of guy at the gym who could easily intimidate those of us still inhabiting our (albeit older and somewhat less taut) 20-year-old frames.

But Mat’s towering physique belies the fact that he is, in reality, a gentle giant. A doting father and a committed partner to his fiancée, Holly, it is clear that he has found a lot of emotional strength through the support of loved ones. And he’s needed it, because Mat’s imposing build also belies the long, complicated, and often very scary journey he’s been on with his health.

Over the past several years, Mat has contended with a staggering and unenviable array of conditions and treatments. His commitment to exercise has allowed him to bounce back quickly each time something hit. Yet it was also his intense fitness regime that first raised alarm bells around the real state of his health back in 2021.

At the time, Mat had not long retired from his first sporting love of weight-lifting – a gruelling pursuit which, as the name suggests, sees competitors pushing, pulling and carrying colossal weights.

“I lifted weights I never thought were possible,” Mat reminisced. This included once winning a competition by lifting 300 kilos (roughly 48 stone) from the floor – one of his proudest moments.

But the toll this sport has on the body is by no means insignificant, and with a physically demanding day job as a landscape gardener, Mat switched to bodybuilding instead. A key difference being that, while weightlifting requires competitors to bulk up, bodybuilding is quite the opposite, as Mat told me:

“With bodybuilding, it’s all about exposing lean tissue with zero fat. You strip away all the rubbish that you don’t need. Working with a coach, I went from 18 stone doing power-lifting down to 12 stone doing the bodybuilding. It was probably the best shape I’d ever been in.”

Then, seemingly out of nowhere, Mat was struck with pneumonia.

Was it caused by the sudden shift in training and diet?

“It’s a hard one to gauge. When you’re getting close to the competition, you’re running on very little food. Your energy levels are low. So the body is probably at its weakest. I asked the doctors, and they couldn’t say either way though. Could just be one of them things.”

Regardless, the dramatic turn of events saw Mat pull out of the competition. His coach recommended he rest and be kind to himself. Mat took this as a green light to drop the intense diet he’d been on while preparing for the show — but this was not without its consequences:

“I just ate like a pig for the next three days — pizzas, pasties, cakes, chocolate, sweets, all the things I hadn’t had for months on end, and my weight skyrocketed from 12 to 15 stone in four days.”

Mat’s bowel also went into overdrive. He found himself constantly running to the toilet with loose stools. He was also passing blood and had pain in the left-hand side of his stomach.

Perhaps understandably, he put this all down to the bowel being shocked by the dramatic change in diet. Mat’s GP also examined him but found nothing ominous, so broadly agreed with his theory.

Soon, however, his body and bowel stabilised, and life continued as normal – until he and his coach began training for the next bodybuilding competition. Once again, his bowel quickly made sure Mat knew it wasn’t happy with the intense shift in diet.

“You deplete yourself right down to the point where there’s very little glycogen in the muscle, then you put a lot of carbohydrates in the system days before the competition, which inflates the muscles out, tightens the skin, and gives you that cartoon of bodybuilding look. As we started doing that my bowels flared up. I was rushing to the toilet almost uncontrollably.”

It was sheer luck that on the day itself, Mat’s bowels behaved, and he was able to compete -coming second in what was his first ever bodybuilding show.

Life went on. Mat’s partner Holly gave birth to their daughter, Willow, and the family went on holiday with Mat’s older children. But Mat continued to experience intermittent bowel issues.

Another visit to the GP and closer inspections at hospital finally confirmed that he had a golf-ball-sized tumour in his colon, which had been growing for two years and had now metastasized to his liver.

Had he expected this result?

“No! It was a shock for me and Holly. I was fit as a fiddle. The week leading up to the actual scan, I’d wheelbarrowed 16 tons of stone up a garden in my day job.”

Mat was 39 years old, with a fiancée and five children, including six-month-old Willow.

“It was obviously a concern, you know, of what happens next,” Mat recalled.

“What happens next,” a consultant explained, would be surgery to ease pressure on the bowel and to form a stoma. For someone who strives for bodily perfection, this news was hard to hear.

“I’d heard of a ‘colostomy bag’, but never of ‘stomas’. I’d never seen one, I didn’t know how they worked, or anything.”

Mat had little time to get his head around things, however. Before his planned surgery could go ahead, he fell seriously ill. It was discovered that his tumour was growing so aggressively that it had now perforated his bowel and grown into his bladder.

Emergency surgery was performed to ease the pressure on the tumour, and Mat woke to see his new colostomy for the first time.

“To be honest, it upset me. Being into bodybuilding and being quite body conscious, having something visually changing how I looked with my top off was quite a hard pill to swallow. The idea of scars bothered me enough when I first got told I was gonna have my stomach cut open. But then to have a bag stuck on me that contained my waste was a lot to mentally process.”

But life with a colostomy was only one thing Mat had to contend with at this time. He was still living with the tumour itself. Owing to its size, he’d first need a course of chemotherapy to shrink it so as to remove it safely.

But before this could begin, Mat was struck by a major infection which doctors struggled to get under control. Steroids, antibiotics, and even a PICC line to the heart were all attempted to alleviate the symptoms, but eventually it was decided further surgery was essential to save him.

Doctors explained to Mat that there was a chance this might mean losing his bladder and a second stoma being formed as a result. But he also understood he had little real choice in the matter.

“Just take the flipping thing out,” he’d told them. “It’s trying to kill me.”

Sure enough, when Mat came round from the surgery, he discovered that alongside his colostomy, he now also had a urostomy. If the former had been difficult to accept, then the latter was a whole other level.

“It’s not just losing my bladder – it affected every part of manhood. You don’t wee. You struggle to get erections. You can’t have kids. It’s a massive thing.”

Mat scarcely had time to process the enormity of everything that was happening to him. Soon after, he had to contend with the course of chemotherapy which had been on hold.

Sadly, the chemotherapy failed to shrink the tumour, meaning Mat faced a third major surgery to remove the affected portion of his liver. Thankfully, the operation was a success, and Mat again recovered well owing to his robust fitness levels.

Even at this point, Mat was by no means out of the woods. Over the coming months he would suffer a twisted bowel not once but twice, requiring yet more emergency surgery – on one occasion when he had just 24 hours to live.

Fast forward some months, and Mat found himself battling yet another health crisis. A urinary tract infection (UTI) had gone undetected long enough to reach his kidneys, putting them at critical risk of failure.

UTIs are a perennial concern for urostomates, as the stoma makes it easier for bacteria to enter the system, while the usual telltale signs of infection are harder to detect – meaning problems can escalate quickly. For several days, Mat’s condition remained precarious, until antibiotics finally gained the upper hand.

Then, in January 2025, Mat finally underwent what he hopes will be his last ever major surgery – this time to reverse his colostomy.

However, while the operation was a success, he was left needing to go to the toilet between 30–35 times a day in the weeks following the procedure. It was another incredibly challenging time.

Despite how debilitating his daily routine was, Mat was now more determined than ever to get back to a normal life – which for him meant returning to peak physical fitness:

“One of my best mates was having his stag do in Ibiza in the May. This was the kick up my ass I needed. I wanted to be in good shape for it. But it was a challenge, because of how often I was needing the loo. I even moved the treadmill outside the toilet door to make things easier.”

Not only did Mat manage to get his athletic form back ahead of the holiday, but the routine was also a turning point for him psychologically:

“It did wonders for my mental health,” he explained, adding, “I proved to myself I could still do these things.”

Any further training for bodybuilding competitions was in serious doubt, however. All the medical advice he received after having his stomas formed warned him to avoid lifting heavy weights or any strain on the abdomen due to the risk of hernias.

It was advice Mat heeded while recovering. But as time passed, he was left wondering what the rest of life would look like if he could never again return to his preferred size and strength.

“I work with my hands. Come rain, shine, or snow, it’s what I enjoy doing and it’s all I know.”

Mat began to question whether the advice he’d been given – tailored to the general public – didn’t reflect his own unique experience as an avid gymgoer.

Cautiously, he began reintroducing weights into his exercise routine, under careful supervision from his coach. Thankfully, Mat’s careful planning worked. Over time he returned to lifting heavy weights and working outside once again.*

Now, Mat had just one final goal in sight – to compete in bodybuilding competitions once again.

But it was one thing to be physically in shape again, and quite another to be psychologically prepared to return to the stage:

“I always wanted to do another show. I just didn’t know if mentally I could process standing up there with the scars or with the [urostomy] bag.”

Encouraged by friends at his gym, Mat stepped outside his comfort zone and signed up for a competition. It turned out to be another powerful turning point:

“It was incredible. I thought I’d struggle with the fact I had the bag on show, but it was like it was invisible. It didn’t matter. It was a part of me. Yes, other people could see it, but it just didn’t faze me. And I thought then, ‘if I can expose myself mentally and physically like this, then I’ve got nothing to worry about’. It did me wonders and that’s the way I now move forward.”

Buoyed by the experience, Mat went on to compete in the British finals, where he was placed 1st and 2nd in two categories.

The things that Mat has achieved with his physical strength are undeniably impressive. Few people reach the levels of athleticism he has – and to do so in spite of all the medical complications he has endured in recent years is extraordinary.

Yet it is arguably Mat’s scars and stoma – both once a source of shame – which reveal his greatest strength is, in fact, his mind over muscle.

Not many of us are built like Mat Dean. You should always seek advice from your stoma care team before attempting any exercise, particularly involving the abdomen.

Support From Colostomy UK

We offer a wide range of support for people living with a colostomy, including our free Stoma Helpline, live chat support, and opportunities to connect with others through local and online groups. We also provide trusted information and resources to offer practical advice, reassurance, and the confidence to live well with a stoma: colostomyuk.org/support