Just Get Me To The Starting Line

New York

I took the industrial orange-painted Staten Island ferry from lower Manhattan on Sunday morning with 1000 other people to run the last scheduled half marathon before the New York Marathon.

As you know, dear readers, I have been training for months to race on November 5. And up until I crossed the finish line on Sunday @ 11:45a.m., I was just plain scared that I wouldn't really be able to meet this last set of challenges--three long races, 13 miles or longer-- in three consecutive weeks. To run for 2 1/2 or 3 hours at a time is something I have never asked my body to do before. I don't know about you, but when I am in that long, rocky, sometimes perilous and insecure place between choosing a goal and meeting that goal, I tend to see all the possible reasons that I can't meet it. My latest one for the NY Marathon is statistical: 4% of total marathon participants are over 60 years old; that's 4% of 30,000 or 1200. I, of course, read that stat as a negative. Well, until Sunday's race. When I finished, I realized that I had just run the fastest half marathon that I had ever run. Amazing, I said. My body is responding to the increase demand. Great job, body.

The story I haven't told up until now is why this marathon is so important to me.

In the spring of 2000, I experienced excruciating pain in my lower back, my midback, and my neck after a competitive tennis match. I went to bed, took some percocet and expected the medication to subdue the pain. But it didn't. I panicked. I knew too much, I suppose, since I had taught nursing at three universities and practiced for 20 years before I began doing medical marketing.

A couple of days later, my physician called with the results of xrays taken of my spine. "Now, Mary, I don't want to alarm you, but the radiologist thinks we need to do a bone scan and a CAT scan."
Bob and I have been friends for awhile, and I knew he was NOT saying something. "What did the films show, Bob?"
"There are some suspicious-looking spaces, almost like holes in your sacrum." Then, he paused, cleared his throat. " He thinks it looks like bone cancer."

I don't remember much after that except that all reason left me for a couple of days and fear took over. Bone cancer, I kept thinking. How could I have bone cancer? No one just has bone cancer. The cancer comes from somewhere else and invades the spine--but it doesn't start there. Cancer? No one in my family has cancer. I do the genealogy and I know ever obit from 1850 to present day. Cancer? Bone cancer?

It took almost 3 months to get a proper diagnosis. It took hours on the phone:1) to find out who was the best spine guy or gal in town; 2) to get an appointment before Christmas( I'll be honest, I called in every chip I had with friends in healthcare to get in sooner ); 3) to hang on until I could get to the day of the appointment.

The neurologist I saw was a seasoned clinician, good at differential diagnosis. After another week of tests, now three months after the onset of the pain, he asked me to come for a follow up visit. "Mary," he began. "You don't have cancer. There's absolutely no evidence of it. However, you do have osteoarthritis and two fractured vertebrae --they are old and presumably happened from your active lifestyle ( skiing, I confessed to him ) and a bulging disc." The big grey xrays made a snapping sound as he slid the bulky xrays out of the light box and turned it off.

He turned to me, hands on hips. "I think your days of athletics are over, especially anything to do with running."

I remember saying to myself, NEVER. I won't lose my mobility, won't lose the fun of being challenged physically. I WON'T.

It took two years before I could run. I did physical therapy, massage therapy, worked with trainers--anything to get stronger. I felt like I'd been given a second chance. I ran my first race in Avalon, New Jersey in 2002--a 5 mile, flat race. I did OK. But it was a confidence builder because I didn't end up in pain afterward. I went on to 10 mile races, then finally half marathons two years ago. And you know the rest.

I've been talking to family and friends about having a party after the race--and planning the party in my head every time I run, especially these gruelling long runs. But I didn't have the courage to send out the invitations until I had finished the Staten island half. I sent them out yesterday.

So, now you know, dear readers, November 5--just getting there-- will be a big celebration for me.

M.C.