InspiredToRun.co.uk

When I left the John Radcliffe hospital in Oxford it was July 2003.   I was terrified of what the future held for me.  I had gone to A&E in November 2002, and had been quickly diagnosed with pancreatitis caused by a gallstone blocking a bile duct.  I was in hospital from November to January 2003 and home in February.  I went back at the start of March 2003 to have my gallbladder removed.  This caused the pancreatitis to flare up and cause many complications, which were life-threatening.  For example enzymes, produced by the pancreas, escaped and started to digest parts they would not normally get to.  When I woke one night vomiting blood I just thought that a blood drip I was having was coming out again.  No!  Enzymes had eaten the wall of the splenic artery.  This involved a transfusion of more than 60 units of blood and I thank everybody who goes to the trouble of giving blood!

What could I do?  Not very much apart from trust everybody to do their best for me and to use the skills they had learned, some through years of experience and others just starting on their own career.  All of them superb and unforgetable; too many to name and probably every department in the hospital - they will know who I mean!

My wife Caren and our three boys, Joe, Ellis and Sean watched with the rest of my family, friends and colleagues.  I had started a new job at Windles three weeks before being taken ill.  They gave me their full support and a job when I was ready to return.

From March 2003 to July 2003 I was on a Nil By Mouth order!  So I had lost a few stone.  I was fed by fluids dripped into my duodenum, below the stomach so that the stomach could heal itself.  My stomach had been cut through to reach and repair the splenic artery.  I lay in bed and was scared that I would never walk again.  Physiotherapists, my wife and family, nurses, a very special health care assistant, stoma nurses and a friend who used to put lines into me for blood and drugs all helped me to believe that it was possible.  A tilt-table was brought into my room and I was put upright for the first time in months.  Scared? Yes but also "quietly determined" - or "stubborn" as my wife prefers to call it.

 Gradually I started to move again.  Sitting on the edge of the bed would be a great achievement, then standing, then walking in a zimmer frame.  Nervously my confidence grew and the distances increased.  I dressed in a dinner jacket and went out with my wife and friends to a charity dinner in Oxford.  I was still Nil By Mouth so it was an odd place to be, but I felt great joy and relief to be out and about doing something that I had taken for granted.  I had got to the age of 42 with very few health concerns.  I was pleased to get back to the hospital for sleep and security but I knew I was going to be well.

My first marathon in 2005 was 5:33:48;  I had enjoyed listening to "Don't Fear The Reaper" on the PA in the Red Start zone.

My second marathon in 2006 was 5:12:33; if I carry on improving like this I will set a record when I am 54.  What made me very happy was spending some time in the Leonard Cheshire reception.  My consultant chose Leonard Cheshire as the charity I should run for because of the great work they do for diasabled people in the UK and around the world.  At one time in hospital after I'd had a cardiac arrest, my wife was told that if I lived I may never live at home again or work again.  I have learned not to take anything for granted.

 I had previously watched the man in the deep sea diving gear.  I knew that I could beat his time and I was pleased this year to be walking back to my car and noticed a Dalek making his way along the Embankment!

 Running has given me strength and great recovery powers.  All my training has been at the Vale of White Horse Leisure and Tennis Centre on a treadmill.  The trainers think I am a bit nuts! I have enjoyed the comfort of watching monitors, like in hospital, telling me that I am going a little further, sometimes a little faster each time.  And the staff, like the John Radcliffe team, superb in their reassurance and belief that I cold achieve my goal.

 And it is easy to think I had a bad time.  I did.  But I arrive at the London Marathon, talk to runners or just read some of the t-shirts and look at the photos of loved ones.  Then I can understand how fortunate I have been.

 Caren thinks I am unusual because I do not worry much.  After all that - why should I?  As I trained for the marathon this year I have watched my father die from cancer after a malignant melanoma was removed in 1990.  The cancer only showed itself again last year, and chemo gave him his last months with a better quality of life.

 This year I also had  a mole removed and this  has tested as a malignant melanoma.  The day after the London Marathon I went into hospital to have more cut from around the removed mole and a lymph node removed.  These are being tested to see if there are further signs of cancer; I am looking forward to good news next week!

 It would have been easy to say "no" to the marathon and hold my place for next year.  But I needed to do it to prove something to myself.  I am not sure what it proves but it helps me to think that I am OK.

 In all of this the most difficult thing has been to understand my mind.  I was so close to being brain damaged, and it has only been over two years' recovery that I have gradually understood how ill I was.  Standing up and driving a car will fool most people that you are well and able to do your sales job.  Bit by bit I have put my mind back together, like a jigsaw puzzle.  In the puzzle there are bits I do not want to put back in, so I leave them out.  I make the pieces that I do want back in take up more space and change shape.  Many things that connect now to the past have helped; concerts, films, family and friends, Dr. Who on the TV and Daleks by the Thames.  It all makes wonderful sense and I hope I can keep on running.

 When I left hospital my consultant (on morphine he was promoted to God) said: "you have used 8 lives, make the most of your 9th."