RnR Chicago Half Marathon - The Road of Missed Marathons, Brain Tumors, and Life Turned Upside Down

So, our next adventure was the RnR Seattle, my next marathon.  We were ready and all but had been tired for work and other stuff, so not sure if we were looking forward to this trip.  Then, the day we were leaving, we couldn't find our check in information.  My husband, sigh, had booked the wrong date and we were scheduled to fly there the next month (*facepalm*).  So, it was partly a relief that we did not have to travel that particular weekend and we were able to cancel everything and reuse the tickets for our next race.

So, on we continued, with me starting to train for the Iceland Marathon.  Then, on July 8th, my husband went to get a CT Scan and found he had a giant brain tumor.  It was a shock to see the picture of his brain with fist + ball inside of it.  It was a tough weekend for us, and we spent it calling doctor friends (being a doctor has its privileges, I guess) and getting consultations with brain surgeons ASAP.  Fortunately, we were 99% sure it was a benign tumor, as it had the particularities of a non-malignant one.  Yay for that.

So, we had a race on July 17th, the RnR Chicago Half Marathon.  I was going to use it as a race effort to gauge where I was training wise.  We asked his brain surgeon whether we could go and he assured us he could and he could run.  So, I decided to run it with him.  He would go straight from the airport to packing and sleeping and then going to the hospital at 5am the next morning, so for us it was our last vacation for who knows how long.  We made the most of it, I am sure, going to our favorite restaurants and sights.  We love Chicago!

The trip was filled with some stress and worries, including that my mom had what I thought was a stroke that weekend but declined to go to the hospital until the weekend after (more on that later).  We raced and had fun, as you can see from the following pictures.  We came close to his PR even though it was a somewhat warmish day:




Overall, it was a great weekend, except for the worry of what was soon to come.  My husband went through brain surgery for almost 11 hours on Tuesday, July 19th.  They removed 65% of the tumor (the rest could not be removed), he had probably one of the best brain surgeons in the nation.  He was home the next day (amazing, right?).  He started running again two weeks post surgery and is now getting ready for his first Half Marathon back from surgery.

Unfortunately, my stress would soon be higher as my mom had a stroke and they found a large aneurysm in his brain.  She went through the same brain surgery my husband had, except hers was a bit different, and her recovery was much slower.  I was able to fly to PR after three weeks of hubby's and her surgery to see her and she is doing much better.  No more stress and no one is allowed to get sick ever!

So, due to all of that, we missed the Iceland Marathon.  Which is fine, I prefer to have a husband and a mother alive and well than running another marathon.  I'll do it next year.

On to the next marathon adventure...next week.

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