The summer Team is logging a 20 miler along River Rd starting at 7am, and the Fall Team has their first 3 mile run at 8am! I will be pulling double duty :-) I hope to get maybe 8 miles in (I am still behind in mileage b/c of my injury). Hopefully mostly pain free!!!
This year my goal is to challenge myself with both running and fundraising.....so I have signed up for the Kauai Marathon and my goal is to raise $5000 for blood cancer research. Kauai's course is mainly uphill and with high elevations, so I will have to really push my training (and keep injury free!). Last year I raised almost $2200, so I want to do 2X what I did before. I know I can do this, and I hope you can help.
Why do I do this? The Leukemia and Lymphoma Society supported my research at the University of MN by giving me a fellowship, and I wanted to give back for this reason. As a scientist, I know that the funds raised supports research that has the best hope to find a cure for blood cancer. This year, I have another reason, my personal honoree, Alie.
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| Alie |
Alie is an amazing little girl (she is Maria's coworkers daughter) who is 8 years old and is currently fighting for her life in the hospital at the U of M. At 3 years, she was diagnosed with Acute Lymphoblastic Leukema (ALL). Can you imagine having to tell your child what cancer is? With chemotherapy, Alie was put in remission by age 5. However, she had a relapse before her 7th birthday, and had a bone marrow transplant with her older sister as the donor. Again, she went into remission, but shortly after her 8th birthday had another relapse, and in February of 2011, she had an umbilical cord transplant. Now, at day 89 post transplant, she is fighting still. She just got out of the ICU yesterday, and is breathing on her own again. She is stronger than I could ever be, and despite my complaining about being injured this season, she has endured and fought more pain than I can imagine. To learn about this strong little girl and to send her your thoughts and prayers you can visit her CaringBridge site:
http://www.caringbridge.org/visit/aliethanig
I train for Alie because I want a world where no child ever has to learn the “C” word and what it means. I train so that no parent has to watch their child suffer through the pain of chemotherapy. I train to find a cure for blood cancer.
If you would like to support me in my efforts you can donate online at:
Go TEAM!
This is a GREAT and AMAZING story, thanks for sharing! She's a great reason to run!
ReplyDeleteThat's awesome Jamie! What an amazing little girl. She's lucky to have a guy like you running for her.
ReplyDeleteWhat an inspiration Jamie. It makes me tear up just hearing Alie's story and how brave she is.
ReplyDeleteNow that we know why you started, HOW did you start? I can run for about 90 seconds but feel like I need 1-2 minutes just to recover. But I can walk 3.5 miles uphill for an hour no problem (which I realize is very slow to you runners out there). I just can't seem to make the leap to actually running but I would like to. I will probably HAVE to after eating hush puppies and barbecue for the next 6 weeks down south!
Thanks everyone! My 9 mile run today with the Team was awesome, everyone always asks how she is doing, and I give her mom updates via email about the Team.
ReplyDeleteJason/Tracy I just started on the treadmill jogging 5 min/walking 3 and kept going. I walked less and started running more til the point I could run for 30 min without stopping. Just keep at it, thats the best advice I can give!