Cancer, Healing and a Fungus helped me set new goals.

 


It is a Sunday night January 9th, 2011 and I know that tomorrow January 10th my life changes forever.  You see in December the doctors found a spot on my lung and the PET scan showed it to be a hot spot meaning yes they assume the C word, CANCER!  So bright and early Monday morning I check into St. Vincents Hospital to have a part of my lung removed...how big of part the Doctor says he will not know until he is in there and sees how much has been affected and what type of cancer it is.  But lets get back to Sunday night.  



I am a person of very strong religious beliefs and I have a testimony that you can be aided in healing with the help of a Loving Heavenly Father and on this Sunday I have gone to my cousin Roy's house for a blessing administered by Roy and my other cousin Donny both amazing men.  As they laid their hands upon my head Roy begin to give the blessing that I know without a doubt comes from my Heavenly Father.  It was amazing,  I could see and feel the love of my Savior in the words spoken and at one point during the blessing I knew that I had been healed, I literally could feel that change take place in my whole being, a warm rush of heat through out my whole body.  And the thought that entered my mind....Unto Whom Much is Given Much is Expected!


On Monday I arrived at the hospital at 5:00 am and by 10 am I was in the Critical Care Unit, only a small portion of my right lung had to be removed and SURPRISE to them NO cancer.  I knew that I had been blessed!  After a very speedy recovery in the hospital I was home to take it easy for the next 8 weeks.  


Does the miracle stop there?  No, it gets even more amazing.  When the lab biopsied the lung tissue they found a fungus in my lung called Cryptococcus neoformans.  A rare fungus that comes from birds.  I was only the 44th person in Oregon to contract this fungus and if left untreated it is fatal.  Never has a thought been stronger in my mind then the one I heard during my blessing "Unto whom much is given much is expected." My thoughts turned towards the Lord and knowing that I had a great job to do and that I had been saved for a reason.  


So what does this have to do with running and my goals for this my 50th year?  


No matter how blessed you may feel when you are going through a healing process it is easy to get discouraged and to feel sorry for yourself and this is just where I found myself.  During the 9 months prior to the discovery of the spot on the lung I had already been through a medical nightmare.  On February 23 while driving to massage school I was rear ended by a young women.  Not a super bad accident some would say, unless you were driving a VW Beetle and had your massage table loose in the back coming flying forward and break the back of your seat thus causing an injury to your lower back for which I had to have a surgery for in June and again in November, and in between these surgeries because of weakness in my left leg  I took  fall in the bathroom and hit the tub and broke 2 ribs on my right side...(which is how they found the spot on my lung).  So yes I was tired of being sick, hurting and tired of being down.  I am a very active person and being down just did not work for me.  So after all this when I finally knew that it was as good as it was gonna get healing wise I made a decision.....I am going to run a marathon! 

Why Running?

I suppose every story has to start at a beginning place, and yes this is my story, so the truth of the matter is I get to tell it just how I want.  My family will tell you that I am a great storyteller.  I can make the most mundane of experience seem like life changing events, that is because to me they most often are just that.  There are very few experiences that we have that do not change our lives in someway.  So I will start with the experience that changed my life and move forward and backwards from there.