Memoir-able (Recovery Part 4)

Howdy blog,

Well there's a couple exciting bits of news I wanted to share.

The first pertains to the recovery of my shoulder. I am now 10 weeks post-op. When I saw the doctor yesterday he continued to be impressed and amazed at how much range my shoulder has. He told me (again) how tight it used to be and that I have the range of motion that I do is just astonishing. It's actually better than the left shoulder now in some regards. There's increased pain in the right shoulder since I've started doing outpatient physical therapy, but that is normal for an operation and should subside soon as long as I make sure to rest it. I have to keep reminding myself of Zen #3: The faster you hurry, the slower you go. You'd think I would have that one deeply ingrained in my recovery process after so many surgeries, but I'm impatient and this surgery has been unlike the others in both its recovery and my abilities post-surgery. It'll be about a year before the right shoulder is fully healed if things continue on the way they have been, but progress will be semi-continuous throughout so it's a promising bit of news.

The other thing discussed during my doctor's visit was the left shoulder. As some of you may or may not know, the left shoulder was nearly identically damaged to the right one, and it was only through the arbitrary filter of how much each one hurt that the right shoulder was chosen as the first to be replaced. The left shoulder is now beginning to ache more, so after I see my doctor in two months, I will likely be having another surgery shortly afterwards. I'm more excited about this than I am any other emotion. With any luck, it will be my last surgery for a while (although I said that last year after my left knee replacement so...I'm cautiously optimistic) and then I can start focusing more on everything that comes after. It'll be nice not to have to think about when I'll be cutting out my bone and replacing it next, maybe I can better focus on writing and other life events after that's dealt with.

Speaking of writing, we move onto my second (I'm including the last two paragraphs as one big semi-related news item) bit of news. I've been working on a memoir detailing my life (briefly described at the end of The Cancer and the Cure) and specifically all the crap with cancer and dealing with the side effects of treatment after the fact. For 16 months I've been doing on and off work with Nick regarding our memoirs, and after all that time...I have finished the rough draft! It's a huge deal for me, because this isn't the first intonation of this book. I tried writing it half a dozen times before and each time wound up abusing drugs or having a mental breakdown from the stress of recalling all of the traumatic experiences in my life. It took an enormous amount of mental and emotional energy to get it out there, and it wore me out to the point of exhaustion, but I finally got through the rough draft and proudly did so in one piece! (Not including all the extra pieces put into me by surgeons) I've been on a short break as school starts, but then Nick and I are going to be going into the editing process and making the books even better.

To celebrate the finishing of the rough draft, here's a small section conscripted from my book Life Has No Title. Until next time readers and blog.

Normally I encountered runners along the path, but today it was just myself and the little white dog. I looked at him, he pointedly ignored me as he usually did, and got an idea. Maybe there could be a runner. Me. I thought back to Nick, who had returned early in the summer and had been spending some time with me. There was a runner, someone who pushed his limits to insane measures and even further than that. If he could run a hundred mile race, why couldn’t I go on a short jog? He once drew inspiration from me as he made his way 3,000 miles, and now I could draw inspiration from him as I ran…a lot less than that.

“Come on Tucker! Giddy-up!” I put one foot in front of the other, picking up speed slowly but surely. The dog started to trot alongside me as I increased my pace but suddenly stopped and nearly dragged me off my feet after just a few seconds. “Okay, fine. We’ll take it slow you little prick.” I started again, making sure to stick to a light jogging pace. Every slap of my foot against the uneven surface sent a strange jarring sensation up my leg. It felt…good. I kept it up, sometimes going a bit quicker, but would soon be dragged back by a resistant dog. After about ninety seconds I gave up trying to pull the little ass along with me and settled back down to a walking pace. “Well that was fun,” I said to myself. Tucker sniffed at a bush.

I wasn’t content with such a paltry result though. During that jog I felt as though I had untapped energy that I could have unleashed had I not had a leashed mutt at my side. I would have to try again.

That’s exactly what I did too. My mom and I were walking the dog this time, so I didn’t have to hold the leash. As we walked, I told her about my jogging experience a few days before and she seemed impressed. “I think I could do better though,” I said, channeling my inner Nick. “Watch this.”

If she protested, I didn’t hear her, because I was off without another word. Uncertain of how fast to go to start with, and not even sure if I remembered how to run properly after five years, I could hear Nick whispering in my ear. “Open it up Bundy!” I’m pretty sure he’s never said that to me in my life, but that’s what I did. I sped away at full-blast and nearly lost my footing in the surprise at how quickly I was going. For a few precarious steps, I was running to avoid faceplanting, but I caught up with myself and sprinted away. I could feel the years melting away as everything around me became irrelevant. None of the pain to remind me of surgery after surgery, none of the aches to remind me of the atrophied muscles and hospital stays. None of the mental anguish harassing me those last couple months as I further slipped into becoming an anxious wreck. It was just me and the path. Everything else was in another world.

The wind rushed by, my legs pounding into hard earth, and on and on I ran, laughing silently and grinning ear to ear by the time I came to a halt as my burning legs asked politely to quit. Besides, I was almost out of bridle path and I would have to make the trek back to my mom. I honestly felt as though I could keep going if I wanted to, the rush was exquisite! I felt, for the first time in years, like a normal human being. It was such an alien feeling I wasn’t sure what to do with it. At least now I knew that my body wasn’t totally trashed, and I knew Nick would be pretty pleased when I told him about this the next time I saw him.

Your one and a half armed overlord,
Andrew

Top Ten Zen Compilation

Hey blog,

Remember how I said that Top Ten Zen #10 would be the last post? I wasn't entirely truthful.

Don't Australians meditate upside down?

Top Ten Zen Finale

Nick and I thought that it might be good if we had the entire list of Top Ten Zen for your viewing pleasure! Isn't that nifty? Similar to the format during the normal Top Ten Zen series, we will give you the quote and a shortened version of our interpretations into one big list! No stories though, but you can click the interpretations if you want to go grab the full story from each of our blogs.

And again, we are very honored to have been able to offer guidance to you and hope that you find good uses for the advice and stories we have laid out for you.

And now...the finale of the Top Ten Zen series.

"Every end is another beginning."

TOP TEN ZEN QUOTES	SURVIVOR’S INTERPRETATION	RUNNER’S INTERPRETATION
“The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step”	It’s easier to break a problem up into smaller pieces and take them on one at a time.	Break the race into smaller segments instead of taking on the whole distance at once.
“Body follows mind”	Your body’s true limits are set by the brain.	Your brain controls how much you can endure.
“The faster you hurry, the slower you go”	Patience is a major key when it comes to recovery.	Staying relaxed and fueled leaves you in control of your race.
“You are not bound by  your past”	The past will only be able to affect you if you let it.	Don’t let past races decide the outcome of your present one.
“Life is only available in the here and now”	Focus on this moment to avoid the stresses of the past and future.	Ground yourself in the present. Be the best you can be in this moment.
“You are the author of every next moment”	You get to decide how to handle your future, no matter how glum or bleak it looks.	Events are just events, and how you react to them is entirely up to you.
“Your own worst enemy lies within”	Nobody hurts you as much as your own negative thoughts.	The mind is the culprit of quitting.
“Once we accept our limits, we go beyond them”	Accept your limitations to get out of the darkest mental pits.	Embrace your limits and you will embody your best self.
“Find joy in every little thing”	When facing hard times, it pays to find things to make you laugh and smile.	Stomp the flowers to get a better grip on the climb, but don’t forget to smell them!
“True strength is found in the face of adversity”	It is in hardship that you get the best glimpse of your true strength.	See every difficulty as an opportunity to prove yourself.

And once more, for emphasis, thank you for reading.

Nick Hollon

Andrew Bundy

Top Ten Zen #10: True Strength

Hi blog,

Well...this is it. The final post down! (Insert song here...you know the one)

Top Ten Zen

Andrew and Nick have compiled a list of Zen-like philosophies comprised firstly of a quote, an interpretation of said quote, and finally a story to drive their point home. This list can aid you in doing anything from completing a 100-mile race to surviving cancer, or obtaining any goal you set your mind to. 

Here are the previous posts for those who missed them:

1. The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step
2. Body follows mind
3. The faster you hurry, the slower you go
4. You are not bound by your past
5. Life is only available in the here and now
6. You are the author of every next moment
7. Your worst enemy lies within
8. Once we accept our limits, we go beyond them
9. Find joy in every little thing

Andrew's first steps after three months of being in a wheelchair

"True strength is found in the face of adversity."

The Survivor’s Take:  It is in hardship that you can get the best glimpse of how strong you truly are. And usually, you’re a lot stronger than you ever imagined.

The Runner’s Take:  See the mountain not as a something to lament about, but rather as an opportunity to prove yourself, either against yourself or your competitors.

Survivor’s Tales: When people find out what I’ve been through, the most frequent comment doled out to me is: “Wow! I could never go through what you went through! You must be so brave and/or strong (they don’t usually say “and/or”) to go through all that!” But I’m not sure that I’m any stronger or braver than anyone else if I’m being honest. Prior to my diagnosis, I would have said exactly the same thing: that I could never go through something so traumatic and difficult. However, that’s exactly what happened. Lurking somewhere within me was an unrelenting strength that refused to let me give up, that refused to let me give in. I don’t think I would have discovered it had I not been diagnosed with leukemia, and I think it’s inside us all. It can be difficult to truly know the measure of your potential until you face hardship. However, when you do find that adversity, it’s amazing what sort of strength you can discover deep within you.

Mountain Tales: I was approaching mile 90 of Ronda del Cims. I’d run out far ahead of Carles (now 4th place) and was trying to gain on 2nd place. I followed flag after flag as the course went off trail and started bushwhacking through high brush and small streams. It was 7:00am, 30 degrees outside and I was soaked! The flags taunted me as they seemed to aimlessly wander back and forth across a powerful 10-foot stream. I slipped once or twice, soaking my shoes, and resolved once again to go crashing through the thick brush. About two hours passed and a very infuriated, agitated Nick finally breached tree level and came into a clearing. I looked back at the hell that I’d just ascended. High bushes, cold streams, no trail, no footing. Adversity at its finest. Each step I took was one more step that I conquered and I reassured myself that I’d likely not come across anything worse than that for the remainder of the race.

Beautiful, but not quite the place you would want to run

Of course, just because we are sharing our own extreme examples does not mean that these philosophies are all strictly for extreme situations. We share these because they can be used by anyone in the proper situations and we invite you, dear reader, to take these helpful tips into the world to use as you see fit. Feel free to hoard them or share them with others. It is both of our hope that these do some good somewhere, and so we wish you luck in your journey of a thousand Zen-filled steps.

And that concludes Top Ten Zen! I would like to say it has been an honor for us both to be able to do this series and be able to share it with so many people. We have received very heart-warming and enthusiastic feedback from many of you and are touched that we have been able to offer help and guidance to a number of people. What started off as a mentality Nick adopted for a race turned into a comparison between styles of survival between us when it came to racing and beating cancer and then morphed into an idea for this series. I have to say, it really has been an enormous pleasure to be able to share our thoughts and experiences with you all and hope that our books have a similar effect when they come out in the near future. You are all, every one of you, fantastic.

Stay tuned to Andrew's continual progress in his recovery as well as his writings and musings at: http://survivingthecure.blogspot.com/
Keep up with Nick as he continues to race the most grueling races he can find at: http://ultrademus.blogspot.com/

Andrew Bundy

Nick Hollon

Top Ten Zen #9: Finding Joy

Hi blog,

We're almost to the end of our mini-epic series of Zenocity! (I don't think that's a word actually...) Just one more after this. I'm already feeling a little nostalgic. What a funny looking word that is...

Top Ten Zen

Andrew and Nick have compiled a list of Zen-like philosophies comprised firstly of a quote, an interpretation of said quote, and finally a story to drive their point home. This list can aid you in doing anything from completing a 100-mile race to surviving cancer, or obtaining any goal you set your mind to. 

Here are the previous posts for those who missed them:

1. The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step
2. Body follows mind
3. The faster you hurry, the slower you go
4. You are not bound by your past
5. Life is only available in the here and now
6. You are the author of every next moment
7. Your worst enemy lies within
8. Once we accept our limits, we go beyond them

Free sledding

"Find joy in every little thing."

The Survivor’s Take: When facing hard times, it pays to find things to make you laugh and smile. Problems don’t seem as heavy when you take them on with a grin and a giggle.

The Runner’s Take: Smile, look up and enjoy the scenery. Stomp on the flowers if they provide you better grip on the climb, but don’t forget to smell them!

Survivor’s Tales: Anyone who has been in the hospital will tell you it’s a pretty boring place most of the time. (It’s generally not a good thing when it gets interesting though.) So to pass the time, and also to keep my spirits up, I played practical jokes. My favorite involved a spoon, some Jell-O, and a very pale nurse. I was too weak to eat the Jell-O myself at the time, and after my mom missed my mouth once with the spoon, I got an idea. We set up, giggling like mad, and put on our game faces as we called in the nurse. Neither of us would specify exactly what happened, only that we “Needed the nurse to get in here right away.” A couple minutes later the nurse showed up and froze as she saw me clutching my eye, little bits of red Jell-O oozing from between my fingers. “She got me in the eye,” I groaned. The nurse turned white as a sheet and quickly spun around, muttering something about getting the doctor. Luckily she had a good enough sense of humor to laugh with us after we stopped her. Finding funny things to cheer you up, whether it’s something as simple as reading a joke book or something as elaborate as a harmless prank (harmless being key), will help get you through the tough times if you remember to laugh as often as possible.

Mountain Tales:  I was coming off of the backside of a notoriously difficult mountain pass. The descent was steep and covered in long patches of dirty snow. I watched as the runner ahead of me plodded down the top of a long snow chute. The runner suddenly slipped and started sliding off down the chute at great speed. I was worried and opened my mouth to yell out to him. But then all of a sudden, he recovered just before he would have careened into the sharp rocks below. He picked himself up and kept moving as if he’d meant to do it all along. Anxiously, I moved closer to the snow chute, plopped my butt down as I’d watched the runner before me do and swoooshh!! I was off lightning fast! Whatever material my shorts were made out of was much faster on snow than the runner before me. I was horrified but I smiled and laughed. The laughter was partially out of fear, partially from the adrenaline, and partially from the fun of getting to sled in the Pyrenees for free! For that brief moment, the competition and the race faded away. I shook off the snow from my shoes and smiled back up at the snow chute, happy to be alive.

How it probably looked to the nurse

Andrew would like to point out that he actually mentioned his story and talked about using humor as a tool to get through cancer treatments in a previous series of his, Awareness Week. The specific post was: Awareness Week: Surviving Cancer, where he mentioned five different methods that could be used to get through the rough treatments and dark times that come along with cancer and the after-effects.

Of course, just because we are sharing our own extreme examples does not mean that these philosophies are all strictly for extreme situations. We share these because they can be used by anyone in the proper situations and we invite you, dear reader, to take these helpful tips into the world to use as you see fit. Feel free to hoard them or share them with others. It is both of our hope that these do some good somewhere, and so we wish you luck in your journey of a thousand Zen-filled steps.

Nick Hollon
Andrew Bundy

Top Ten Zen #8: Beyond Our Limits

Hey blog,

I know last post was a bit...melancholy. However, today will be much more cheerful and uplifting!!! (All the extra exclamation points must make it true!!!) Consider it the second part of a mini-series within the mini-series if you would.

Top Ten Zen

Andrew and Nick have compiled a list of Zen-like philosophies comprised firstly of a quote, an interpretation of said quote, and finally a story to drive their point home. This list can aid you in doing anything from completing a 100-mile race to surviving cancer, or obtaining any goal you set your mind to. 

Here are the previous posts for those who missed them:

1. The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step
2. Body follows mind
3. The faster you hurry, the slower you go
4. You are not bound by your past
5. Life is only available in the here and now
6. You are the author of every next moment
7. Your worst enemy lies within

Self-acceptance, now with 100% more hair

"Once we accept our limits, we go beyond them."

The Survivor’s Take:  Once you learn to accept your limitations and flaws you can begin to pick up the pieces after a great hardship. Positive self-talk can haul you out of even the darkest pits.

The Runner’s Take:  Race your own race. Be happy with yourself, your own abilities, your own strengths and your own weaknesses. Embrace your limits and you will embody your best self.

Survivor’s Tales: 2008 was not a good year for me. It took some time for me to get out of the funk I was in following my release from the hospital. In fact, it took several excruciating episodes in my life, one after another, to finally admit I had a drug problem and start to go to rehab (albeit with some initial resistance). I used daily positive self-talk to tell myself what a great job I was doing and how strong I was for making it through all that I had and continuing to stay sober. As my head began to clear, I realized part of my original problem was a result of not wanting to come to grips with what my new physical limitations were. It took a couple years before the lesson sank in in its entirety. Once I started to accept my limits, I could start to really enjoy life and rebuild all that I lost with the cancer and the cure.

Mountain Tales It was the very first climb of Ronda del Cims. The trail was brutally steep and covered in tree roots. I was breathing heavy and could feel my heart rate soaring out of control. A group of about ten runners clicked against my heels directly behind me as I practically breathed through the shirt of the runner in front of me. I didn’t respond well to this many people crowding my personal bubble, especially when running that hard. I sighed heavily as runner after runner broke past me, each of them breathing hard and working their way up the mountain pass. I stood back for a moment and looked down at an almost constant stream of athletes rising up the switchbacks beneath me. “Race your own race,” I said to myself. “Be happy with your own abilities Nick.” I broke into a walk and took control of my breath and heart rate. Twenty miles later, I was alone and closing in on fifth place.

When Nick gets anxious, he turns into a...Nick figure...sorry...

Of course, just because we are sharing our own extreme examples does not mean that these philosophies are all strictly for extreme situations. We share these because they can be used by anyone in the proper situations and we invite you, dear reader, to take these helpful tips into the world to use as you see fit. Feel free to hoard them or share them with others. It is both of our hope that these do some good somewhere, and so we wish you luck in your journey of a thousand Zen-filled steps.

Andrew Bundy
Nick Hollon

Top Ten Zen #7: Your Worst Enemy

Hey blog,

This post might seem a little depressing. In truth, it's kind of a mini-series within the series, so it ties into a much happier and uplifting post! Don't worry, everything works out...look, a meditating kitty! See? Told you.

Hopefully this makes up for the semi-depressing post  

Top Ten Zen

Andrew and Nick have compiled a list of Zen-like philosophies comprised firstly of a quote, an interpretation of said quote, and finally a story to drive their point home. This list can aid you in doing anything from completing a 100-mile race to surviving cancer, or obtaining any goal you set your mind to. 

Here are the previous posts for those who missed them:

1. The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step
2. Body follows mind
3. The faster you hurry, the slower you go
4. You are not bound by your past
5. Life is only available in the here and now
6. You are the author of every next moment

Nick on the verge of deciding he
wanted to quit life

"Your own worst enemy lies within."

The Survivor’s Take: Nothing hurts you more than your own negative thoughts.

The Runner’s Take:  The mind is the culprit of quitting.

Survivor’s Tales: After suffering through cancer and GVHD and just barely escaping from the hospital with my life by the thinnest edge, you would assume that I would be thrilled to be out in the world, that I gained a new appreciation of life. No. Instead, I looked at the scars and my bloated figure and felt an intense black hatred for myself bursting through to infest any hints of happiness and gratitude that dared poke its head up. As a result of this self-loathing, I began to heavily abuse my medications in an attempt to blot out conscious thought and all the pain that came with it. I could have chosen to be happy about surviving, but instead I wallowed in agonizing self-pity and righteous self-hatred. I chose that of my own volition, angry and hurt by everything that happened to me, disgusted by my appearance. I chose that path. But as we’ll see in this next post, although you can make yourself quite miserable with just the flick of a thought, you can also instill a great deal of satisfaction in the same manner.

Mountain Tales:  It was 3:30am, some 19 hours into the Ronda del Cims. Carles (3rd place) and I were deep into the race and had accumulated over 30,000 feet of gain. We were far from the finish and battling through the night together. Passing a stream Carles looked at me and said “Quince minutos llegamos.” Fifteen more minutes and the two of us would be at the mile 85 aid station, Illa. Thirty minutes later, Carles glanced over and said to me “Cinco minutos, seguro!” Five minutes clicked away with no aid station in sight. The two of us hurt, our pace was fading, our energy dwindling and our morale all but vanished. “Does Carles even know what he’s doing?” I could feel my body weaken as the poisonous thoughts continued to fester in my mind. I stopped. I had to change my mindset. I looked up at the full moon, pine trees blocking off the distant high peaks, and I felt alive and blessed to be wandering through the Pyrenees. I smiled and resolved that the damned aid station could have been hours away, it didn’t matter. I’d made peace with my own worst enemy.

Andrew's worst enemy lies within and a little to the right

Of course, just because we are sharing our own extreme examples does not mean that these philosophies are all strictly for extreme situations. We share these because they can be used by anyone in the proper situations and we invite you, dear reader, to take these helpful tips into the world to use as you see fit. Feel free to hoard them or share them with others. It is both of our hope that these do some good somewhere, and so we wish you luck in your journey of a thousand Zen-filled steps.

Nick Hollon

Andrew Bundy

Top Ten Zen #6: Every Next Moment

Hi blog,

One more than halfway there! (Insert song here) Sorry, I had to hum a few lines of Bon Jovi. Shall we get on with it then?

Top Ten Zen

Andrew and Nick have compiled a list of Zen-like philosophies comprised firstly of a quote, an interpretation of said quote, and finally a story to drive their point home. This list can aid you in doing anything from completing a 100-mile race to surviving cancer, or obtaining any goal you set your mind to. 

Here are the previous posts for those who missed them:

1. The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step 
2. Body follows mind
3. The faster you hurry, the slower you go
4. You are not bound by your past
5. Life is only available in the here and now

The author of every next "S"

"You are the author of every next moment."

The Survivor’s Take:  You get to decide how to handle your future, no matter how glum or bleak it looks. You can either choose to think poorly or you can resolve to think positively in every next moment.

The Runner’s Take:  Events are just events, nothing more. How you react to that climb, that descent or that long stretch of road is entirely up to you.

Survivor’s Tales:  When I was first diagnosed with leukemia just three weeks before I should have graduated high school, I was understandably a little bummed out. After all…I had cancer! For the first day of officially being a cancer patient I was numb and quiet and said next to nothing, just nodded occasionally. However, by the next day I wrested my mental faculties away from the shock and started to think about what would be happening to me. “Well,” I told myself. “You can either be abjectly miserable and have a crappy time, or you can approach this with a smile and a middle finger toward your stupid bone marrow cells.” I opted for the second choice, and sought out a silver lining. Well, I didn’t have to take any finals! No teacher would dock points to poor ol’ me for not showing up to take the tests because I was being pumped full of chemotherapy drugs. I seized upon that (amongst other positives) and chose how I would feel in that next moment and all the ones after it.

Mountain Tales: 20 hours into Ronda del Cims I was coming off of the backside of the longest climb of the race, Pic Negre. The trail was a quad murdering combination of steep talus slopes, scattered rocks and cold biting wind. I’d kept 5th place up until this point but I glanced back and could see several runners closing in on me up from above. I took a step forward and smashed my entire right foot sideways into a rock, knocking it loose and groaning loudly as it whacked into my left ankle. Initially, it hurt. But I immediately thought back to the above quote, “I decide.” I whispered to myself. I tried hard and managed to forget about the pain.  I lifted my head up high and could feel my legs cramping and my stomach growling. I loved running the descents back home, so what was the difference now? “There isn’t one,” I told myself. Faking a smile, I drifted down into the trees as the lights of my competition faded behind me.

Nick decides one finger is enough

Of course, just because we are sharing our own extreme examples does not mean that these philosophies are all strictly for extreme situations. We share these because they can be used by anyone in the proper situations and we invite you, dear reader, to take these helpful tips into the world to use as you see fit. Feel free to hoard them or share them with others. It is both of our hope that these do some good somewhere, and so we wish you luck in your journey of a thousand Zen-filled steps.

Andrew Bundy

Nick Hollon