RunOnRocks wrote:
“I am at least a little bit alive right now and that kicks ass.”
QOTD right there.
Thanks, yeah I really felt full of piss-and-vinegar that day.
RunOnRocks wrote:
“I am at least a little bit alive right now and that kicks ass.”
QOTD right there.
Thanks, yeah I really felt full of piss-and-vinegar that day.
Avocado's Number wrote:
This is the kind of thread that makes this message board worth a damn.
Thanks for that; I wasn't sure whether this was catching much interest. I'll post more.
Running and Life, or, Running versus Death
Sub-8 Mile's Battle-o-Rama
(maybe this story will, in some way, help someone you know; if so, that's cool. oh, and F Cancer.)
Chapter 4
January 2016
It’s been months of chemo.
The grocery store is hard. I can barely get around the aisles; I'm leaning on the cart for support like a very old man with a walker, nearly slumping to the ground with each exhausted maneuver. I am sickly, decrepit, bald, no eyebrows, and I can barely stand or see.
I was chock full of tough self-talk not too long ago. But those days are done.
My unhealthy-looking flesh is puffy. Despite barely eating for 4 months, I’m swollen and bloated with the extra 40 pounds that I have packed on from the steroids (those, plus the weak remnants of my willpower, are the only things currently propping up my still-breathing carcass).
I grip my cart and shuffle with difficulty as I peer through the fog of my contorted vision. I’m 41, but people think I’m in my mid-to-late 70’s. Other shoppers, with alarmed faces, give me plenty of room as I struggle through the store. I mutter and curse at how hard this is. Juice, I need juice, gotta find juice, can’t find the damn juice. F*** ... ok, juice. Where is the f***ing mayonnaise in this goddam place? Mayo, sh!t, mayo, f*** f*** f*** mayo … ok, got mayo.
***
20 years earlier, running college track, I would grind out workouts that I was unprepared to handle -- such as 8 x 400m, running the repeats in 58 sec. Those were hard sessions for a pisspoor D3 track guy running 20-25 mi/week, with no prior base training, doing zero tempo runs, zero mile repeats, and zero faster-than-58-pace speedwork.
Although they were long ago, those bad-idea-in-the-context-of-other-training workouts were GREAT training for this, now, in Fall 2015 and January 2016.
Back then, after just the third 400m repeat, I’d know I was in trouble. But there were five more to go, so there was nothing to do but tackle the fourth 400 and hang on. Then the fifth, seriously, we have 3 more of these?? It took some grit, and it built toughness. I didn’t end up with better race times, but I never said uncle.
***
That’s how I push through this nightmare. One week to the next, one month to the next, worse and worse, never say die … until the day when I finally do say die.
I have tests coming up at the end of January, to see whether the chemo has wiped out that tumor, or whether, maybe, since mine is extra-special mean and nasty and aggressive, maybe that tumor ate all that heavy-duty chemo for lunch and multiplied itself around my insides. If the latter, then the doctors will prescribe more of this we’re-gonna-dump-max-chemo-into-you routine.
But I can not. I just. Can. Not.
I am done. Tired. Not sleepy. Tired. Deep down.
Not tired to my bones. Deeper.
I feel tired to my … soul.
Running an impossibly hard 8 x 400 workout where you’re not sufficiently in shape to be doing the workout, you’re dead in the middle of the third repeat, so there is no such thing as a NINTH repeat, because you can’t even complete the mandated eight … but you do the eight anyway; somehow, you get through the 6th, the 7th, the 8th. There will be, however, no 9th. That’s it. You are done. More than done. You were done at 3 and you did 8.
I feel like that, but times ten thousand.
My life force has been entirely spent on enduring this up to now; from here, I have nothing more.
If there is more cancer, there will be no more chemo. I can’t.
No more. I will slip away into that good night.
The day comes. I feebly make my way to the cancer center. They draw my blood. I gulp down the disgusting liquid chemical concoction. They scan my body.
They are going to tell me my fate in a few days. For now, I go home to my quiet cottage in the winter woods. I have the heat set at 50 degrees because I can’t really feel the cold, so why spend money warming this drafty old place? I can barely move anyway, so I’m pretty much in bed, wearing sweats under a pile of blankets.
Outside my large swing-open-like-a-barn-door windows, squirrels and rabbits occasionally dart about on the barren snowy ground, hoping to survive and escape the hawks that swoop silently from above.
Inside my frigid home, I wait.
Awesome story and thread man.
Did some searching for you, don’t know your size but figured I’d drop this for you to check out.
Keep on keeping on.
Good piece, keep it up.
passingby wrote:
Did some searching for you, don’t know your size but figured I’d drop this for you to check out.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/333584060240
Holy cow. Those look almost perfect. Dang - I'm a size 12 in Saucony -- old Saucony from that era (and before) at least -- I don't know if their sizes have changed in more recent years. But, yeah, for the Shay XC flats, the old pair I have is a 12.
That was really kind of you, thanks. I appreciate it.
Funny, how long-term chemo brain works. You'd think I could have been searching on ebay myself ... but I didn't remember that this is a thing that exists.
After walking on Monday and biking on Tuesday, I felt like getting out for another "return-to-running" jog. So yesterday (Wed) I walked up a trail to a spot I measured last week, a flat-ish loop approx 1/2-mi (according to GPS).
I was feeling good, so I decided to see if I could do the entire half-mile without stopping. Success! 4 minutes and 50 seconds, thank you very much. And the crowd goes wild!!!!
Shockingly, I felt ok to do another, then another. I am so friggin proud to write THIS right now:
4 x 1/2-mi with 2 min rec @ 4:50, 4:56, 5:06, 4:56. BOOM
HR was 155-160, but back down to 100-110 each time.
Jogging at 10-min pace for half a mile at a time isn't generally very impressive, but I was pretty pumped. I didn't even notice my feet burning until I was walking back down the trail afterwards.
Running and Life, or, Running versus Death
Sub-8 Mile's Battle-o-Rama
(maybe this story will, in some way, help someone you know; if so, that's cool. oh, and F Cancer.)
Chapter 5
Late January, 2016.
There is a massive blizzard. It snows over two feet.
I’m in my cottage waiting for my appointment day to arrive, so I can find out whether I still have cancer. Technically, I’m snowed in, but I don’t care. It’s a difficult journey to get to the kitchen or the bathroom, so I’m not about to leave the house anyway.
***
Months ago, when they found the tumor, they tested my blood for hormones released by the cancer. They said that normally the levels would be zero, or maybe three max … units of something. They said that if the levels were above that, it would be an indicator of active cancer. If the levels were above 100, that would be serious cancer. If the levels were above 1000, that would be very serious cancer. My levels were above 5000.
I wonder what my levels are now.
***
Days later, the snow is still there, outside the cottage, keeping me trapped from leaving. I was hoping it would disappear, but there it is.
I’d like for the cancer to have disappeared. I don’t know if it’s still there, preventing me from living, keeping me trapped in this routine of doctors and poison.
I have to go to my appointment tomorrow; today, it’s time to shovel. The two feet of snowfall has compacted into 16 inches of heavy snow on my driveway. With no energy to curse, I scoop and push the weighty shovelfuls. I gasp and grunt. My skin is too deteriorated to make sweat. I work slowly and deliberately for 10-15 minutes at a time, taking 30-40 min breaks. My heart rate soars. This probably isn’t in line with doctors’ orders.
It doesn’t occur to me to quit. A workout is a workout. You know when you start, that it will be long and that you will suffer. At every point in the workout, you know what you are doing right now, what you have done so far, and what you will be doing next. With each running step, each labored inhalation, each completed repeat, you see the end and you work towards it.
And so this is my workout. The sun works its way across the clear winter sky. I shovel, heave, rest. Many times, I nearly collapse from dizzy exhaustion. Nearly. But not quite. Because I’ve been here before; I know the edge; I know how to push it.
“You will always recover.” Did I say those words? Just now? Did someone say them to me? Long ago, when? In my late afternoon near-delerium, the world is spinning, the driveway is my track, and the square meters of snow are the measure of my remaining workout.
I start at 10 in the morning, and the driveway is finally clear at dusk. Exhausted, I sink into bed and sleep.
The next morning, I drive to the cancer center. I walk very slowly into the doctor’s office … I don’t want to hear this news, because if there is cancer then it will be the end. I forget that I was strong enough to shovel the driveway yesterday.
I don’t feel fear. Right now, I am too tired to feel actively afraid. I am simply reluctant to rush forward and learn that it’s over.
In the office, the staff looks at me without speaking. I am directed to a room.
I sit. I wait.
5 minutes is like 5 hours.
Right now I am neither alive nor dead. I am in limbo. Soon, I will discover what there is to know, and then perhaps I will feel something.
I wait.
The oncologist enters. She has a manila folder in her hands. She opens it on the counter, with her back turned to me.
She takes out some papers, and turns around to face me.
She is beaming.
There is no cancer. The tumor is gone, destroyed as if it never existed. My blood levels are normal. There is no trace of cancer anywhere in my body.
You should be cured now, says my oncologist. We never use that word with cancer, because it can possibly return, but with the amount of treatment that you were able to do, and with there being absolutely zero detectable cancer at this point, this is very likely a cure. She smiles with her accomplishment. She knows that this patient will not be back.
I am elated.
The doctor leads me outside the room, into the main area, where the patients are all receiving their treatment. All the staff are waiting. They announce and cheer. It’s incredible! "The guy doing all the chemo" is cancer-free!!
Somebody rings the bell, loudly and proudly. Everyone claps. Hugs all around. Here in the cancer center, this is a rare happy moment for all to share. The other cancer patients -- sitting in a wide arc of armchairs, hooked up to their various poisons -- all have bright smiles and hope in their hearts. If that guy could do it, so could they.
A new celebrity, I go around shaking hands and saying words of encouragement.
More high-fives, then I jubilantly stride out of there.
Until I run out of gas in the lobby. I sit down in a chair for 10 minutes, then I get myself up and make my way to the exit at a more realistic cancer-patient walking pace.
Yesterday’s workout in the snow is long forgotten, like it never happened. I am thinking about the big workout, the 4 multiday repeats of intense heavy-duty poison, done over a period of months.
I realize that I have completed this test. I did it. I won.
As I drive down the street, tears stream down my face as I roar in triumph and pound the roof of the car. “YEAAHHHH!!!”
Little do I know … this feat of suffering and survival, this test of determination and endurance that pushed me to the point of failure just as I finished, this was the only the warmup.
Perhaps the blood test was LDH (lactate dehydrogenase). Shows a breakdown in tissue from cancer. Interestingly I never had poor blood values including LDH, but that is common for some lymphomas. Like mine you know nothing is wrong until a lump pops up somewhere.
Interesting. Mine was a normal body hormone, which for some crazy reason is actively & excessively produced by this particular type of cancer's metabolic process. So it's a telltale sign and a key "blood marker."
It's been a big week. "Return to running" workouts this week:
Wed: 4 x 1/2-mi (trail) with 2 min rec @ 4:50, 4:56, 5:06, 4:56
Fri: 5 x 75m uphill strides
Sun: 4 x 1/2-mi (trail) with 2 min rec @ 4:45, 4:22, 4:36, 4:44. Pace was a bit fast, but my recovery was fine.
Other days were 3-mi walking or 5-6 mi biking.
Sub-8 Mile wrote:
Running and Life, or, Running versus Death
Sub-8 Mile's Battle-o-Rama
(maybe this story will, in some way, help someone you know; if so, that's cool. oh, and F Cancer.)
Chapter 5
Late January, 2016.
There is a massive blizzard. It snows over two feet.
I’m in my cottage waiting for my appointment day to arrive, so I can find out whether I still have cancer. Technically, I’m snowed in, but I don’t care. It’s a difficult journey to get to the kitchen or the bathroom, so I’m not about to leave the house anyway.
***
Months ago, when they found the tumor, they tested my blood for hormones released by the cancer. They said that normally the levels would be zero, or maybe three max … units of something. They said that if the levels were above that, it would be an indicator of active cancer. If the levels were above 100, that would be serious cancer. If the levels were above 1000, that would be very serious cancer. My levels were above 5000.
I wonder what my levels are now.
***
Days later, the snow is still there, outside the cottage, keeping me trapped from leaving. I was hoping it would disappear, but there it is.
I’d like for the cancer to have disappeared. I don’t know if it’s still there, preventing me from living, keeping me trapped in this routine of doctors and poison.
I have to go to my appointment tomorrow; today, it’s time to shovel. The two feet of snowfall has compacted into 16 inches of heavy snow on my driveway. With no energy to curse, I scoop and push the weighty shovelfuls. I gasp and grunt. My skin is too deteriorated to make sweat. I work slowly and deliberately for 10-15 minutes at a time, taking 30-40 min breaks. My heart rate soars. This probably isn’t in line with doctors’ orders.
It doesn’t occur to me to quit. A workout is a workout. You know when you start, that it will be long and that you will suffer. At every point in the workout, you know what you are doing right now, what you have done so far, and what you will be doing next. With each running step, each labored inhalation, each completed repeat, you see the end and you work towards it.
And so this is my workout. The sun works its way across the clear winter sky. I shovel, heave, rest. Many times, I nearly collapse from dizzy exhaustion. Nearly. But not quite. Because I’ve been here before; I know the edge; I know how to push it.
“You will always recover.” Did I say those words? Just now? Did someone say them to me? Long ago, when? In my late afternoon near-delerium, the world is spinning, the driveway is my track, and the square meters of snow are the measure of my remaining workout.
I start at 10 in the morning, and the driveway is finally clear at dusk. Exhausted, I sink into bed and sleep.
The next morning, I drive to the cancer center. I walk very slowly into the doctor’s office … I don’t want to hear this news, because if there is cancer then it will be the end. I forget that I was strong enough to shovel the driveway yesterday.
I don’t feel fear. Right now, I am too tired to feel actively afraid. I am simply reluctant to rush forward and learn that it’s over.
In the office, the staff looks at me without speaking. I am directed to a room.
I sit. I wait.
5 minutes is like 5 hours.
Right now I am neither alive nor dead. I am in limbo. Soon, I will discover what there is to know, and then perhaps I will feel something.
I wait.
The oncologist enters. She has a manila folder in her hands. She opens it on the counter, with her back turned to me.
She takes out some papers, and turns around to face me.
She is beaming.
There is no cancer. The tumor is gone, destroyed as if it never existed. My blood levels are normal. There is no trace of cancer anywhere in my body.
You should be cured now, says my oncologist. We never use that word with cancer, because it can possibly return, but with the amount of treatment that you were able to do, and with there being absolutely zero detectable cancer at this point, this is very likely a cure. She smiles with her accomplishment. She knows that this patient will not be back.
I am elated.
The doctor leads me outside the room, into the main area, where the patients are all receiving their treatment. All the staff are waiting. They announce and cheer. It’s incredible! "The guy doing all the chemo" is cancer-free!!
Somebody rings the bell, loudly and proudly. Everyone claps. Hugs all around. Here in the cancer center, this is a rare happy moment for all to share. The other cancer patients -- sitting in a wide arc of armchairs, hooked up to their various poisons -- all have bright smiles and hope in their hearts. If that guy could do it, so could they.
A new celebrity, I go around shaking hands and saying words of encouragement.
More high-fives, then I jubilantly stride out of there.
Until I run out of gas in the lobby. I sit down in a chair for 10 minutes, then I get myself up and make my way to the exit at a more realistic cancer-patient walking pace.
Yesterday’s workout in the snow is long forgotten, like it never happened. I am thinking about the big workout, the 4 multiday repeats of intense heavy-duty poison, done over a period of months.
I realize that I have completed this test. I did it. I won.
As I drive down the street, tears stream down my face as I roar in triumph and pound the roof of the car. “YEAAHHHH!!!”
Little do I know … this feat of suffering and survival, this test of determination and endurance that pushed me to the point of failure just as I finished, this was the only the warmup.
I teared up over this and I hope you’re not about to crush us all with a plot twist.
Amazing. Please keep it coming.
This past week's training log:
No running. After 3 "running" sessions last week, I thought I'd stick to biking and walking this week, and then try running some again next week.
Mon - walk 3 miles
Tue - bike 7 miles
Wed - bike 22 miles (that was a lot for me and I was exhausted)
Thu - bike 9 miles (very tired from yesterday)
Fri - walk 1.5 miles (sore during walk)
Sat - OFF
Sun AM - walk 1.5 miles, slow pace (still tired from biking)
Sun PM - bike 3.5 miles
Starting to get a little muscle in my legs. I'm still skinny-fat, but my weight is down to 174 from 182 earlier this spring.
I'm exhausted, though. Normally post-cancer, I'm tired all the time. Not sleepy, but some kind of persistent, latent tired feeling. Right now, with all this exercise, I'm pooped.
It's not like it's a ton of training, and it's not like I can't actually do what I'm doing. But last night I slept for 11 hours and I was tired from the moment I got out of bed this morning.
Don't get me wrong - I'm not interested in being whiny about it. Just saying, wow man I am dang tired! Even though I'm so well rested that I couldn't sleep a wink right now if I tried. So it's kinda weird.
Last week's training: Three return-to-running "workouts for a total of 7 miles, plus I biked 50+ miles in a week for the first time. This morning (Mon), I am a little sore but man it feels good.
Mon AM - walk 2 mi easy pace, bike 1 mi, run 2 x 10’ with 1’ rec, 5 x 2’ with 1’ rec. Pace was around 10 min/mi or so. Was planning on 3 x 10’ but after 2’ into the 3rd rep it was too difficult, so I broke up the last 10’ into 5 x 2’. Bike 1 mi cooldown.
Mon PM - bike 3½ mi
Tue AM - walk 1.5 mi, easy pace
Tue AM2 - bike 11 mi
Tue PM - bike 11 mi
Tue PM2 - bike 3 mi
Wed AM - bike 2 mi, 4 x ½-mi on lightly-rolling trail, with 2’ rec @ 4:50, 4:49, 4:56, 4:53
HR was 160-165, back down to 105-115 between reps. bike 1 mi cooldown.
Wed Noon - bike 7 mi
Wed PM - bike 3½ mi
Thu AM - bike 3½ mi
Thu PM - bike 1½ mi
Fri - 3½ mi bike
Sat - run approx 1½ mi on rolling trail @ approx 9:40 pace
4 x approx 150m hills, 10% grade gravel road, 2’ walk down rec. 49, 42, 45, 45. Went a little easy on the first one; the 2nd was too fast to do all reps at that effort.
Sun - OFF
Total walking - just 3.5 mi
Total biking - 52 mi
Total running - 7 mi
Thinking about it, I don't know if those hills last Saturday could have been just 150m. If so, I was pretty slow. Gonna go back and get a better measurement (I got 150m from an online GPS map) ... I'd expect it's really closer to 200m. Will verify one way or the other.
Fantastic thread. Keep it going!
Last week I wasn't able to do much.
Mon - OFF, sore
Tue - OFF, sore
Wed - something like 50-100 lunges, throughout the day
Thu - 200+ lunges, throughout the day
Fri - 100+ squat-jumps, throughout the day
Sat - 1.5 mi walk
Sun AM - 1.5 mi walk
Sun PM - 1.5 mi walk
Running and Life, or, Running versus Death
Sub-8 Mile's Battle-o-Rama
(maybe this story will, in some way, help someone you know; if so, that's cool. oh, and F Cancer.)
Chapter 6
February 2016
I’m wearing a Superman shirt that my friends got me during chemo. On the back is a checklist:
(checked) Beat Cancer
(checked) Beat Cancer Again
(unchecked) Save the World
(unchecked) Take a Nap
It’s pretty much my favorite shirt, and I wear it frequently because frankly I feel cool when I wear it. With my brain partially melted or whatever, from all the chemo, it’s sort of like giving a superhero outfit to a kid with an intellectual disability. It literally makes my day every time I put it on. I am always excited to see it in the clean laundry because I know I’m wearing it tomorrow.
I have begun to recover just a little, and I now look like I’m 62 instead of 78. Zero people think they are seeing a guy who's barely over 40 if they see me around town.
I'm getting looks, proudly chomping on a gigantic burger in a restaurant, wearing my too-tight Superman T-shirt, still fat from the months of steroids. I don’t realize that the shirt is so small on me; my brain doesn’t process everything and I am unaware of many things. But I do notice that, when I get up to go use the restroom, people get quiet when they see the back of my shirt.
***
Early March 2016
I’m focused on work. After three trade shows where I checked out dozens of possible new products and suppliers, I am now heading to a manufacturing plant two states away. It’s a 5-hour drive; the manufacturer’s rep is driving me along with two of our wholesale partners down to tour the plant so that I can evaluate this potential new business relationship.
I don’t realize it, but I’m acting like a crazy idiot during the entire drive. Ranting about weird nonsense and delivering lengthy monologues about other vehicles on the road. My scrambled brain is delivering a mishmash of oddball stream-of-consciousness. My colleagues are bemused, but they very kindly don’t say anything to me about it.
During the factory tour, I repeatedly ask weird questions and I make bizarre observations about the facility. However, I am somehow able to represent my company well enough for the team I’m meeting with to get both the COO and the CEO to talk with me because they want to make sure they get the deal. They end up sold, and I am sold too. Deal done, bloated old hairless strange-ass me notwithstanding.
***
Late March 2016
It’s time for a follow-up, to confirm that there is no cancer. They take my blood; I drink the disgusting drink; they scan my body. A few days later, I meet with my oncologist.
No fanfare this time. Two months ago I was famous around here; now I’m just some guy with no cancer. The doctor tells me that my blood and scans are normal. She says that soon I will start feeling more energetic and that I will be able to exercise again.
It’s spring, and I’m looking forward to biking to work, 4 miles thru the state park. And I’m really looking forward to being able to run.
The oncologist warns me that it will take some time to get back to normal. Months, possibly a year or more. My body will need to restore itself after the damage done by the aggressive treatment. She says that I can expect to return to normal, but that there will likely be some aches and pains along the way.
Aches and pains? That I can do.
I go home and get my bike out of my cottage’s tiny basement. I find my running shoes. As I stretch my hamstrings for the first time in over six months, I dream of PRs at all distances.
Outside the flung-open windows of my peaceful cottage, buds are on the trees. Vibrant green stalks of what will be flowers are coming up in the lawn. The earth is shaking off the winter and coming back to life. So am I.
I’m Superman. Anything is possible.