Biathlon Challenge - Are You Up To It?
Next February 18th is the date I have set aside to compete in my very first Biathlon. At school I was a little better than average at sport (that was the sound of Brad closing the door in case the wind blew off the tickets on myself - boom boom), and my adult life has been peppered with me running with regularity for several months, then not at all for several more. Round and round the exercise bush. Like most people I know. Except Brad, who was an athlete and so was paid to exercise vigorously every day. Now that he's retired and not paid to keep fit, he can hardly be convinced to walk to the shop. Just kidding (sort of). When he was at his fittest, I really admired the level of fitness he had and the body to show for it (!) Like most people, I wished I had the ability to commit to getting that fit and healthy. And like most people, what I lacked was the motivation to do it.
That was until I got so sick - in case you're new to this blog, I'll update you (I'll keep it short and sweet regular readers). About 7 months ago, I had a sudden onset of the most incredible pain I have ever experienced, and I have had two natural child births. The pain was on the left hand side of my face and can be best described as having someone stab you constantly in the face. The pain is completely off the richter scale and is dubbed the 'suicide illness' because of sufferers propensity to take their own lives because they can not get relief from the pain.
The illness is called Trigeminal Neuralgia and is often very difficult to diagnose due to the lack of awareness of it. I was on incredibly strong pain killers like morphine to deal with the pain before I finally had brain surgery in March. The brain surgery became complicated because I contracted bacterial meningitis and so could have died. It took me a very long time to recover from the surgery. I couldn't see much out of my left eye for months which caused awful vertigo and was generally so run into the ground, that at times, it felt like I was dying. All up this year, I have spent a total of about 11 weeks in hospital (not to mention how many I have spent in bed at home) and been subjected to all the prodding and prodding that goes with it - contrast MRI scans, MRI scans (without the contrast i.e. the die they inject into you), CT scans, copious amounts of blood tests and copious amounts of IV morphine, ketamine and litres of antibiotics to kill the meningitis. At one hospital - which I won't name because I've been legally advised not to - the nurse set my subcutaneous ketamine dose from 10ml per hour to 100ml per hour. If I hadn't picked up the mistake myself by knowing what it should have been, I would have died. So that's 11 weeks in hospital with two possible near death experiences (!) Anyway, I didn't die and so feel very fortunate. Unfortunately though, the ordeal isn't over and I'm still not 100%. There is a chance that I may have to have the brain surgery repeated. Over my dead body I say (which I shouldn't considering my odds are quite high!!). I'd rather live with the weekly attacks than go through all that again. About once a week the pain comes back. Compared to the relentless pain I had before, this is living a dream!
What I have missed though (apart from a plethora of other things, but this blog isn't about that), is my health. At stages over the last 10 months, I have barely been able to walk. As someone who could - before the illness - just decide to put on my joggers and start running, with ease, this has been incredibly tough. Getting back to that point is a challenge. A challenge that has given me motivation in bucket loads. No, make that truck loads. Which is where the biathlon comes in. The Trigeminal Neuralgia Association of Australia (TNA) has asked me to be their patron, which means I have to raise awareness and funds. More motivation!
I want you to join me in competing in the biathlon. PLEASE.
It's not hectic. Just a 300m swim and a 4km run. It's about as easy as they come. When I was in Melbourne last week for my travel story, I stayed at Crown Towers and practiced the swim. It was too easy, I was so stoked! I now need to train for the run but have to wait a couple of months before tackling that one. But I will. Because I need to get my health back to where it was before and I need to do this to raise awareness for the TNA and some funds along the way. I'm thinking that everyone in our team could be sponsored. But that's something I need to discuss with the TNA.
I'm going to enlist as many people as possible - my close circle of friends, football player friends, celebrity friends.... as many as possible. The more celebrities the better because of the awareness factor. I'm going to put everyone in our team in cool TNA t-shirts.
So put it in your diary, make a commitment, use the story or the story of someone you know who has been sick as the motivation and start training. The TNA needs you and I need you. The more the merrier. Afterwards, I am going to organise a knees up somewhere to celebrate. To some of you, that might be motivation enough.
It takes place on Thursday November 18th at 6:30pm in Sydney at Lady Macquarie's Chair (around the Botanical Gardens then into the harbour for the swim). We'll enter as a Corporate Team - if you know any Corporates who want to sponsor, please let me know.
If you want to take part in the TNA team, send me an email at: info@melissaseymour.com. Please pass this on too. You never know, you may have some friends who want to take part?!
And ladies, if you need any further motivation to enter, check this out:http://www.andersonevents.com.au/BiathlonRaces.php
xMel
