I love to run. Or I used to. In the past five years, body
has gone from expressing mild resistance to running to flat out refusal.
Injury, pain, and general malaise would be the three top descriptors of my
post-cancer running career.
I’d built my identity around my status as a runner and, even
as my relationship with the sport soured, I held onto the hope that with enough
time/training/nutrition/motivation my post-cancer body would return to
pre-cancer performance.
I had never been a run-every-day-to-keep-a-streak-going kind
of runner, but I loved the endorphin high of a good run. I had never been fast,
but I did track my distance, pace, and race times religiously, comparing
current race pace to prior runs and rejoicing with each new personal record.
I celebrated every incremental increase in mileage, owned
more than my share of training magazines and manuals, and had at least one
race-like event scheduled for almost every month of the year.
I ran solo for stress relief. I ran with my canine friends
for the sheer joy of it. I ran with other women for the camaraderie of a group
of like-minded health conscious people. But mostly, I ran for the continual
hope of being better, stronger, and faster than I’d been a week, a month, a
year earlier.
I ran through pregnancy. I ran through a lumpectomy, a
mastectomy, and breast reconstruction. I ran through the death of my daughter.
I ran through my recurrence—through the post-op infection, every single round
of chemo, and even through the seven long weeks of radiation during which I was
forbidden to wear a bra so as to preserve the tattered remains of skin that
flapped under my arm with each foot strike.
I ran through fatigue. I ran through pain. I ran through
grief. Running was my magic pill, the fountain of my seemingly boundless
energy. Running made me feel invincible. Running kept me sane.
I was probably over-invested in the sport, given the fact
that my finishing times put me in the bottom third of any given race field.
However, I didn’t run for speed or glory. I ran because I thrived on the thrill
of setting a new goal and penciling a training table into my day planner,
knowing that with determination and hard work, I could achieve it.
My devotion to my running habit was part ritual, part
religion. It defined me. Everyone knew I was a runner. I wore the mantle with
pride.
Maybe it was pride that led to my fall from running’s grace.
Less than one month after my final chemo session, I finished a 5K race. A month
after that, I completed a 15K. I was still congratulating myself on my speedy
cancer recovery when I started radiation the following week.
Not wanting to take any time off from work, I did radiation
on my lunch hour, racing to the hospital and back in less than an hour’s time.
I finished up my afternoons on the job, and then went home to round out the day
with my husband and daughter. I was tired—beyond tired.
I should have rested, but radiation created its own layer of
stress, which could only be put to bed with a good hard run. I kept pushing,
despite my exhaustion. I did not want to yield any of my hard-fought progress
to the ghost of cancer.
I started tamoxifen shortly thereafter and the side effects
slowly crept up on me, encroaching upon my goals. I decided to train for a
marathon, with the hope that this new training goal would reinvigorate me and
kick-start my running habit, which had begun to feel uncomfortably forced.
I slogged through the training and finished the marathon.
Since I’d already put the hours into increasing my mileage, I took advantage of
my well-conditioned heart and lungs and signed up for a few more half-marathons
to maximize the maintenance of my endurance. With each one, I was slower. My lungs
burned with the effort, but my legs were leaden.
I could no longer keep pace with my running buddies. I was
perpetually winded and struggling to catch up. I described the dip in
performance to my oncologist. She was not only familiar with the symptoms; she
was well-versed in the cause. “Over time, tamoxifen can cause chronic fatigue,”
she explained.
I'm almost embarrassed to admit that my desire to return my running to its former glory, to once again be able to keep
up with my peers was a driving force in my decision to drop the drug. I quit swallowing my daily dose and running did get easier—but
not as easy as I remembered it had been in my pre-treatment life.
I had an urge to train for another marathon, but I knew that
to do it in the state of my current body I would have to add planned walk
breaks. I floated the idea to my running buddies, but their reception of the
suggestion was chilly. They’d been so patient with my physical limitations
throughout treatment that it didn’t seem fair for me to make any more demands.
I abandoned my marathon aspirations and limped along, still
trying to keep up, but questioning more and more the selfish motives behind my
break-up with tamoxifen. I’d quit a medication that was integral to my
treatment plan mostly because its side effects were having a negative impact on
my performance? Maybe running wasn’t keeping me as sane as I’d thought.
My training partners seemed somewhat surprised when I
abruptly announced that I was going back to the evil med. I started taking my
half-dose and within a month or two, found myself right back where I’d started,
sucking wind and cursing my body as my friends breezed on with ease.
It was only then that I realized that it wasn’t fair to hold
myself to standards set for the body I used to inhabit. The cure for my performance
woes would require a drastic course correction. I set a new goal—to run-walk a
marathon at a comfortable pace—and, in deference to it, dropped out of my
training group.
I lost touch with my running buddies pretty swiftly. The end
of our kinship wasn’t particularly surprising, given the superficiality of the
tie that bound us. Our relationships were rooted in our shared love of sport.
Without the run, there was no friendship to speak of.
At first, I missed the support of spending long miles lost
in conversation, but the addition of an iPod to my regimen rekindled my passion
for the interminable hours on the road. I trained by myself, completing each
scheduled run-walk at a pace and intensity that finally fit my body.
In the end, I didn’t complete the marathon—a knee injury at
mile 20 sent me hobbling to the aid station for a ride back to the finish line—but
I did redeem my athletic career. The trade-off for my ability to go the
distance was simply releasing the aspiration of setting any new land speed
records along the way.
I still have moments when I miss running, but I’ve come to
grips with the fact that it no longer suits me. In those rare moments when I
feel sorry for myself and wish that I could still run, I remind myself that my
body has carried me through the worst of times. The least I can do to repay that
favor is to respect its limitations.