Help Matthew raise money

I was diagnosed with testicular cancer at the age of 25. Despite knowing at that time that it is one of the most treatable cancers (to the point of being considered curable), the diagnosis still shook me to my core. 25 is not an age when you even consider the possibility of having cancer.

At that time, I was just two weeks away from running my first marathon, which I’d spent the past four months diligently training for; to that point I had logged 503 miles in training. 

Following standard procedure, I was scheduled for surgery… just 4 DAYS BEFORE THE RACE. Being young and naïve, I asked the surgeon if I would be able to run in the race that soon after the operation, to which he figuratively replied ‘absolutely not’ (for the record, on the day of the race I was only able to walk half a mile, which took 15 minutes).

With the surgery scheduled, I ended up running a marathon the week before the race; the first 18 miles were by myself, with friends showing up at various points over the final 8 miles. So my first marathon was run mostly by myself a week before race day with the specter of cancer looming over me. 

The moment my watch read 26.2 miles, I knew I was going to run in that same marathon the next year. Cancer had tried to steal that from me, and I wasn’t going to let that happen.

As luck would have it, my cancer showed no signs of spreading post surgery and I didn’t need further treatment, allowing me to immediately jump back into running, which was the perfect outlet. Since cancer tried to steal running from me, with every mile I could feel it getting more and more owned. I know that It’s going to be absolutely coping and seething when I cross the finish line of the 2023 Philly Marathon.