Episode 5 is about the importance of exercise during and after a cancer diagnosis along with the amazing friendships made along the way.
Yoga and walking were my outlet during breast cancer. Nearly every day of my medical leave I did a DVD called Gentle Yoga and it provided me with an inner peace and surrender. Walking and training for the Avon 39 provided me with a physical goal. I fondly remember first mile run after chemo. The cold spring air filled my lungs, thrilled to be used again! Now, five years out, I maintain a physical goal each year that I set with my January resolution. This year was a special year, five years out from my cancer diagnosis. I ran in the Fort for Fitness Half Marathon and I loved every minute of it. There were a few difficult humid training runs, but it was true progress in a relationship of learning to trust my body and marvel at all it can do. The Avon 39 is one of the most difficult challenges of endurance... one day of walking a marathon and the next day of walking a half marathon. If you think walking is easy, give this a try!
I walked the Avon 39 with my mom in Chicago
in 2015. Then I signed up for NYC with my friend and Instagram pink sister, Alana. We were joined by our fellow pink sister, Tiffaney for a bridge and some cheering stations. It was an experience of a lifetime, crossing the Brooklyn Bridge in a pink tutu, as a survivor. Alana was an amazing walking partner, I marveled at her tenacity and endurance. She was determined to finish, even wearing and adjusting her foot brace. She never had one ounce of quit!!! Tiffaney made us laugh, telling other walkers the distance remaining was less than actual... not on purpose but funny as always. Together, the three of us marched back into Manhattan like a boss!!!
Tiffaney, Alana and I may have found each other on Instagram because of breast cancer, but we have bonded over craft beer. We LOVE microbrews!! As a breast cancer survivor, we are so much more than our diagnosis, we are layers and layers with many interests. Alana and I walked into the finish line together to Rachel Platt’s fight song. We raised our arms togethe, grateful and humbled by how far we had come!!
