In 2001 I set out to pursue my lifelong dream of competing in an Ironman triathlon. While I was training for the Ironman I came upon an even bigger challenge; I was diagnosed with late-stage colon cancer. The ten months that ensued revealed how I deal with adversity and obstacles.
June 21, 2001 was the longest and worst day of my life. I was diagnosed with stage III colon cancer, an advanced stage of the disease. I thought I might die, and I feared I was going to have a grueling, painful, knock-down, drag-out battle with chemotherapy that might leave me dead, or worse, suffering. I have undertaken many challenges throughout my life, and I have always been creative and persistent in attempts to solve them, but this challenge was off the chart. My family and I discussed my options with several doctors, and it was clear that emergency surgery the next day to remove the eight centimeter tumor in my colon was a good place to start.
As I lay in bed the night before surgery, I reflected on my father's life. My father had died of cancer my junior year in high school, and although he was at peace with how he had lived his life, it made diagnosis even more scary, since I knew that I, too, could die from cancer. That realization caused me to take an even closer look at my life. Living an ethical life has always been important to me, and I was proud of how I had lived my life thus far. I realized the three things that mattered most to me are: the goals I choose to pursue, my integrity, and how I overcome obstacles. Because I have remained true to these three values, I knew I could achieve peace in my life.
The morning before surgery I woke up with a calm mind, realizing that no matter what happened, I could deal with it. If I ended up dying, it was not going to be with unfinished business or regrets about how I have lived my life. Chemotherapy is ruthless, but people live through it and go on to have wonderful, fulfilling lives. If chemotherapy was what I had to go through to stay alive, then so be it. With that peace of mind, I headed in for surgery.
A month after surgery I started a regime of six rounds of chemotherapy, each lasting four weeks: one week of chemo, two weeks of side effects, and one week off. I savored that one week a month when I did not feel sick and was able to leave my bed. During that precious week I went on trips to windsurf, mountain bike, rock climb, hike, and ski. In fact, my oncologist is so proud of me that she hung a photo of me windsurfing on her wall to inspire other patients. The other three weeks I was very ill, and I spent many days and nights during chemotherapy dreaming about being able to race triathlons again. I even went so far as to bring my bicycle up into my bedroom and put it next to my Lance Armstrong posters as a visual reminder to myself of why it was worth fighting to stay alive.
Chemotherapy seemed to be working, but I did not stop there. I reached out to everyone I knew to learn from them how to deal with cancer and chemotherapy. After talking with friends and experts, reading books, and doing volumes of research, I ended up taking a holistic and multifaceted approach to healing. I did not want to rely only on chemotherapy when I could also treat all other aspects of my mind and body to improve my chances of survival. To help my body I learned yoga, exercised, received massages, and took strange herbs from a Chinese herbalist. To treat my mind I saw two psychotherapists and surrounded myself with friends. It is nice to know that after years of being there for friends, they were there for me.
I am very conscious of my integrity and how I treat other people. I pride myself on being generous with my time, my knowledge, my friendship, and my possessions. I seek out the opportunity to help and mentor friends as they explore new activities from triathlon to sales to coping with cancer. I strive to treat everyone with this same respect, at work as well as at home. For example, in sales I am candid and honest with my customers and am fair in my negotiations with them. My customers appreciate my honesty, and I believe this has played a significant role in my success.
Maintaining my integrity is also important to me in athletics. I want to win and compete to be the best at what I do, but I am not willing to sacrifice how I treat other people to get there. In fact, it has been my experience that the two are not mutually exclusive. I first tasted success in competition in middle school through local squash tournaments, and I was hooked. I took lessons every week, practiced on my own, and even went to squash camp all in pursuit of my long term goal of a national ranking. I enjoyed playing, but it was clear that I had to put in hard work to achieve this goal. I was in the top thirty in the nation in my age group, but my dream was to be in top ten. All of the kids in the top twenty were fabulous squash players, but I believe what differentiated them was their mental toughness. Some kids were mentally tough because they were absolute jerks, did not care about anyone but themselves, and were willing to win at all costs. I did not like them, nor did I want to resemble them. I aspired to emulate the few who were gracious, polite, represented themselves and their clubs well, and who won their matches with good sportsmanship. After doing some research my family and I found a coach who worked on the mental aspects of winning, and I trained with him for four years. It paid off. By the time I was fourteen I was tenth in the nation in my age group and I was proud of how I had arrived there and how I behaved on court. I learned the importance of sportsmanship at a young age, internalized its value, and carried it over to other sports and to my career, and my life's challenges.
Chemotherapy was an unwanted challenge. In the workplace I seek out challenges in the form of jobs that stimulate me intellectually and allow me to continue to learn. A job in sales fit the bill. There were new skills and product knowledge that I had to acquire, and I had the opportunity to collaborate with people from different functions within the company. I was working hard, enjoying it, learning, and progressing towards my goals. I decided to invest some additional time upfront in order to master sales as quickly as possible so that I could exceed my quota working a reasonable amount, allowing me time to train for triathlon season. Again, I took a comprehensive approach to mastering sales. I read every book on sales and customer satisfaction that I could find, and when I was not reading a book on sales, I was listening to sales books on tape in my car. I took courses on presenting, joined Toastmasters to improve my public speaking and leadership skills, and attended several sales training courses. I did everything I could, and it worked. I was able to be true to my job and myself by exceeding my sales quota and still having time to train and enjoy my day to day life.
I am particularly proud of a recent challenge that I undertook. On September 21, 2002, I raced Xterra Nevada, a mountain bike triathlon, and my first triathlon since I finished chemotherapy. It was an absolute joy to be suffering up a grueling climb on my mountain bike with my back cramping only to be rewarded with a gnarly descent and a brutal run. That pain was so much more enjoyable than the pain of chemotherapy. I had control of the pain on race day. I could let up if I wanted to, but instead, I chose to keep riding hard. During the awards ceremony of the Xterra triathlon the announcer brought me up on stage to recognize my accomplishment of racing once again after overcoming cancer. It was particularly emotional for me since during chemotherapy I had dreamed of this moment when I would be able to race a triathlon again. After receiving a huge round of applause, I briefly told a bit of my story in the hopes that it might inspire someone in the crowd facing similar challenges.
I have not forgotten my Ironman dream. Now, a year after cancer I am training once again. I proudly registered for the 2003 Ironman Idaho. I am determined not only to finish, but also to go fast. However this time I am not only racing for myself. I have decided to do an individual fundraising effort to support the National Colorectal Cancer Research Alliance. Cancer definitely delayed my Ironman goal, but it did not stop me. I am back at it now, and I am taking a creative and multifaceted approach to achieving a lofty goal. Armed with the friendships I have maintained, my integrity, and the endurance to face challenges, I dream about the day when I will cross the Ironman finish line and hear the traditional Ironman announcement, "David Belden, you are an Ironman!"
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