When I received my biopsy results in February, 2025, the urologist grimly explained that my prostate cancer was aggressive and it was highly likely it had metastasized. My wife and I were devastated. I was an older athlete who worked out several times a week and watched his diet - I felt I had done everything right to achieve a long and healthy life yet fate had other plans.
I would like to think that this development would make more conscious of the temporal such that I would have a new-found appreciation for the positive aspects of my life…but, unfortunately, that wasn’t to be. Initially, I focused on the potential loss of my athletic pursuits, that which defined me and gave me purpose and I felt guilty for launching my wife into a caretaker role so soon after her mother’s passing. However, though the radiation and the drugs made me uncomfortable, I continued to cycle. During one such ride where I was moving slowly and feeling sorry for myself, I met a fellow cyclist, a retired physician, who had undergone this same journey a decade ago. He assured me that this is the darkest part of the journey - things will get better and, although I may be suffering, I shouldn’t stop cycling. And I didn’t.
During the fall and winter, I still rose early on Saturday mornings and headed for the ice rink to teach my skating classes but there was nothing heroic about that. I was simply trying to normalize the situation and carry on the best way I knew how, but the reporter from Channel 15 disagreed. I was interviewed for a story about how the well loved skating instructor was still teaching children despite having stage 4 cancer. I was flattered but a little embarrassed because I felt that I wasn’t doing anything special and certainly not newsworthy.