Running and Walking with Heart: Marathons and Cancers #6
Today I am grateful for shelter from storms, literally and figuratively. I am also grateful for all the gifts and experiences running has brought to my life.
I am thinking of my dear friend Sheila, her husband Dave, and their friends and family who will be doing the "Out of the Darkness" walk tomorrow morning for the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention. They will be walking in memory of their daughter Carli who died by suicide on April 4, 2017. I am walking with you in spirit Sheila and carrying you in my heart as I do every day.
Breast cancer is also part of the shared history and enduring friendship Sheila and I have. She is a BC survivor too; facing her diagnosis, surgeries, and treatment in 2011. When Darcy and I ran the Sioux Falls Marathon on 9/11/2011, emotions ran high. I was thinking of Sheila, of the 10th anniversary of 9/11, of running the streets of the city where Darcy and I got married and lived for two years. We also met our future daughter-in-law Alyssa that day along the course. It was another marathon higher on the list of special ones.
On Sunday, Darcy and I head to the starting line of the Fox Cities Marathon. My sister Mary Jo heads to round 4 of chemotherapy next week. She was diagnosed with metastatic breast cancer in March. She is facing the most serious diagnosis any of us have had to face, and she is living my worst fear. Metastatic is the "m" word no cancer patient or their loved ones wants to hear. She is living one day at time, one hour at a time when the worst of the nausea and other cancer and treatment effects hit her. She finds gratefulness, even under these circumstances.
I will be running for Mary Jo, for Sheila, in memory of Carli and others who have died by suicide, in memory of those who have died from MBC. I will be running feeling the gift of life and limbs, starting next to Darcy, both of us healthy and ready.
And I will be wearing this shirt:
It was designed by my niece Linley and my sisters and I each have one. We wear them in solidarity. It carried me across the miles of the Twin Cities Marathon last year, thinking of Leonice as she continued active treatment for her cancer. This year, it is Mary Jo that I will be sending extra energy to, along with many others.
"What lies beneath?" reminds me that my flat chest just makes my heart more close to the surface, more prominent in how I live my days and run my marathons.
"A full and thankful heart" reminds me that to live gratefully is the greatest way to honor this amazing existence we get to partake in.
All any of us have is today. Live it fully and gratefully. Live it a moment at a time and a stride at a time.
See you next week!
I am thinking of my dear friend Sheila, her husband Dave, and their friends and family who will be doing the "Out of the Darkness" walk tomorrow morning for the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention. They will be walking in memory of their daughter Carli who died by suicide on April 4, 2017. I am walking with you in spirit Sheila and carrying you in my heart as I do every day.
Breast cancer is also part of the shared history and enduring friendship Sheila and I have. She is a BC survivor too; facing her diagnosis, surgeries, and treatment in 2011. When Darcy and I ran the Sioux Falls Marathon on 9/11/2011, emotions ran high. I was thinking of Sheila, of the 10th anniversary of 9/11, of running the streets of the city where Darcy and I got married and lived for two years. We also met our future daughter-in-law Alyssa that day along the course. It was another marathon higher on the list of special ones.
On Sunday, Darcy and I head to the starting line of the Fox Cities Marathon. My sister Mary Jo heads to round 4 of chemotherapy next week. She was diagnosed with metastatic breast cancer in March. She is facing the most serious diagnosis any of us have had to face, and she is living my worst fear. Metastatic is the "m" word no cancer patient or their loved ones wants to hear. She is living one day at time, one hour at a time when the worst of the nausea and other cancer and treatment effects hit her. She finds gratefulness, even under these circumstances.
I will be running for Mary Jo, for Sheila, in memory of Carli and others who have died by suicide, in memory of those who have died from MBC. I will be running feeling the gift of life and limbs, starting next to Darcy, both of us healthy and ready.
And I will be wearing this shirt:
It was designed by my niece Linley and my sisters and I each have one. We wear them in solidarity. It carried me across the miles of the Twin Cities Marathon last year, thinking of Leonice as she continued active treatment for her cancer. This year, it is Mary Jo that I will be sending extra energy to, along with many others.
"What lies beneath?" reminds me that my flat chest just makes my heart more close to the surface, more prominent in how I live my days and run my marathons.
"A full and thankful heart" reminds me that to live gratefully is the greatest way to honor this amazing existence we get to partake in.
All any of us have is today. Live it fully and gratefully. Live it a moment at a time and a stride at a time.
See you next week!
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