Coming off the high

Hi everybody,

I've got some more good news and some more not so good news. I'll start with the good news, since that's the accurate order of events. Saturday morning we met up for team practice in the pouring rain and high winds. My pace group met up, led by the amazing Noah, and charged through. We ran 7 miles, and as I previously told you, that's the most I've ever run at one time!! It was such an exhilarating run. We do these long runs at a conversational pace, meaning your breathing should be calm enough to talk the whole time. We ran 5 as a complete group, and then I separated with this girl Remmy to run the 6th mile (people run different distances based on their level and whether they're training for a half or a full). Remmy and I shared some chocolate gu just to get a little boost, and then I left her at mile 6 and ran an out-and-back by myself for mile 7. I was singing Jason Derulo to myself in my head for that last mile, and it felt A-W-E-S-O-M-E. That was the first time I really felt "holy shit, I might actually be able to do this". I felt great after 7 miles - really strong. I have to say I owe it all to Coach Mike. He gave us this extensive lesson in nutrition and I followed it to a T before that run, and I kept it at a genuinely conversational pace, and voila! I did it!

So, I was pretty high on life after that run on Saturday. I hopped the train to Boston for Grandpa's second round of chemo at Dana Farber/Brigham and Women's. This treatment hasn't been going quite as well as the first. Grandpa got a 101 degree fever overnight, and also developed an infection, which they think is pneumonia. His appetite and energy were low, and he really was feeling uncomfortable today. I think it snapped us back to reality. We got really lucky with the first treatment, since he had no fevers, no infections, and no real side effects to speak of besides grogginess. This is the reality of cancer though, and this is the reality of chemo. They take their toll on the body.

The doctors have him on antibiotics to fight the pneumonia and some tylenol to manage the chest pain and the fever. He saw Dr. Stone today, and we just met with Dr. Takeda (who Grandpa thinks I should marry). Oh and also there is this nurse Barbara who we didn't meet last time who looks like my aunt Gail. My Grandma of course had her camera with her at the hospital and we of course had to take a picture with this Gail look-alike. The people at this hospital are so freakin nice and obliging.

So, we're hoping for the best for tonight and tomorrow. Hoping for no chest pain, no fevers, and a quick recovery from the pneumonia. I hope I hope I hope I hope I hope I hope I hope... My TNT teammate Cullen Naumoff is a non-Hodgkins lymphoma survivor and her mantra is that the body feels what the mind thinks. Give it only positive thoughts to digest. So, that's our plan.