Q&A with Author and Cancer Survivor
Paul Weigel
Photo Courtesy: Paul Weigel
After the Q&A, readers will find an exclusive excerpt from Iron Dad.
Dad's Special Bond with his Daughter Helps Him Beat Cancer
"Over the years, it has been important to me that she understands how much my life has been transformed and is better because she is in it. I wanted her to continue to learn and understand about the power of perseverance and resilience." ~ Paul Weigel |
As someone with a healthy lifestyle, what was your original reaction to your diagnosis?
I think my reaction to the diagnosis was the same that anyone else has. It doesn’t matter whether you are healthy or not. The apocalyptic future was right in front of me.
I couldn’t believe this (having cancer) was happening, that I could be so sick, even though I had symptoms that doctors and I had ignored over the years and had talked about – changes in what foods I could tolerate, extreme fatigue, blood in my stool when I went to the bathroom, and then weight loss (which I had attributed to my increased training regimen). My blood work didn’t show signs of cancer, either. After all, I was 43 years old and was training for an Ironman. Having cancer wasn’t anywhere on my radar.
The moment I learned I had a tumor, I had so many questions, and I didn’t even know where to begin. I was overwhelmed with the thought of a million experiences I might never have — my daughter learning how to ride a bike, going to school, attending her first prom, getting married, and having kids — and how I would do everything to be there for her as long as I could.
As an athlete who pushes himself, have you used some of the same tools/mantras you use during training (the ones that keep you going while training for a marathon or triathlon) in your fight with cancer?
Without a doubt. I’ve been a believer in the mantra, “If you believe the impossible, the incredible can come true,” and I recognize that we can be at our greatest when facing the most overwhelming challenges. When your back is against the wall, you just do what you have to do.
As I was going through treatment, I made a point to not think about myself as a cancer patient. Being diagnosed was not going to slow me down. I tried to think of it as just a small blip in the road ahead of me. There were going to be good days and bad ones, but as long as I kept moving forward and fighting like hell, I knew I could achieve some of the most amazing things.
I’ve also learned how important it is to have a strong family structure around you. This is key in any battle we must overcome — going through an experience like fighting cancer alone is not one you want to have.
Do you believe that positive energy and a positive mindset can help heal a body physically?
That’s honestly been one of my biggest takeaways as I’ve looked back on my cancer journey and the years afterward. I have carried as much positive energy and maintained as much of a positive mindset as possible, every single day.
My life had been a hard one growing up. And then, as an adult in my 30s, before getting married and having our daughter at 40, I was miserable, working hard and playing harder while living in downtown Seattle. I quite often wonder if the stress and difficult upbringing I had early on in my life contributed to my illness.
My life had been transformed once my daughter was born, and from the moment she was in my arms, I knew I had something to fight for and needed to maintain a positive mindset. This carried forward as I went through treatment. I had a vision that I was not just going to survive cancer and treatment, I was going to destroy it, obliterate it, and thrive afterward. That’s part of the reason I envisioned completing an Ironman Triathlon so soon afterward — that by carrying this positive energy and mindset, my body would heal even more quickly. My doctors and I recognized that by maintaining this attitude throughout my treatment, I got stronger through treatment which was virtually unheard of.
Sometimes extreme stress can take its toll on a family. Have you grown closer with your daughter since the diagnosis? How has she supported you?
Extreme stress does take its toll on a family. It certainly did for my marriage. My wife and I had struggled before my diagnosis, and the stress and strain of the cancer and treatments ended up being too much for the two of us. Shortly after my treatment was complete, we planned for our divorce.
My daughter and I have always had an incredible bond. The first night she was born I walked with her throughout the maternity ward for hours on end as we waited for her mother’s milk to start coming in. We eventually figured out that I carried her for 45,000 steps, nearly 22 miles. I couldn’t imagine not spending time with her – and that relationship has continued for the last 14 years.
Natalie was three when I was diagnosed, so at the time she didn’t understand anything about cancer, how ill I was, and my incredible worry, even while maintaining a positive mindset. What she knew was that Daddy was at the doctor often and cried a lot for several years.
It has been incredibly important for me to maintain a strong relationship with her. When her mom wanted to move to Arizona from Seattle after our divorce, I followed to make sure I could see Natalie every day. She played soccer for five years with me as a coach, not necessarily because she loved the game, but because she wanted to spend time with me.
Now that she’s a teen, she has started to ask more questions about my diagnosis, treatment, and what happened when I learned I had cancer. This is how my book came about. It is just as much a love story about how important she has been to me as my battle with beating cancer. As I’ve become an evangelist to increase awareness about colorectal cancer, she’s been actively involved in learning more and even in participating in activities and events. She even stood by Katie Couric as I was interviewed for a public service announcement. Pretty cool stuff!
What do you hope your daughter has learned about you/life in general as she watched you take this journey toward healing?
When I was first diagnosed and then finished the Ironman triathlon in Whistler, I wanted Natalie to know that her Daddy wasn’t a quitter in case I wasn’t here for her later (if cancer eventually beat me). Over the years, it has been important to me that she understands how much my life has been transformed and is better because she is in it. I wanted her to continue to learn and understand about the power of perseverance and resilience. She’s done that already in so many ways — she is an incredible student and finishing first in her age group in different races.
More importantly, I’ve learned from her and continue to do so every day -- the power of love, friends, and what it means to be happy. She’s so much more than I ever expected and has developed a tremendous model of love on her own, based on trust, affection and respect. I couldn’t be any prouder.
EXCERPT
Iron Dad
(Three Piques Blinked)
© Paul Weigel
(Three Piques Blinked)
© Paul Weigel
“You need to step back and let the doctors do what they need to do,” the nurse whispered to me over my shoulder as more and more people were quietly ushered into the room, everyone focused on the task at hand. Four, five, and then six doctors, all at different stations, a team, with everyone knowing their role and responsibility, except for me. All I could do was watch.
More and more equipment rolled in behind me on that cold floor, each with lights and buzzers and more cords, rain pelting down on the dark window in Seattle’s Swedish Hospital on a February evening. I couldn’t even begin to think or process the whirlwind. But it was obvious the baby was stuck, and time was running short.
I nodded, trying to breathe, though nothing seeming to matter. There would be no cutting of the cord, no baby on her mom’s chest, no magical moment when we would hear her announce her entrance into her new world with a cry, telling us how unhappy she was. This wasn’t how it was supposed to be. Instead, machines beeped, incubators were plugged in, the doctor asked for different tools, and nothing seemed to make a difference as they tried to pull Natalie out and I wondered how many more seconds before we’re rushed to the OR because the clock was ticking. And then, with a twist and a turn, a teeny, little purple face with hair started to emerge, looking angrier than a grumpy old man, the umbilical cord looped around her neck.
Slowly, delicately, Dr. Johansen lifted the cord up and around her head, and the baby girl slid on out. Her scowling eyes wondered what the hell was going on as she was transferred straight to another series of doctors at the warming table across the room. It was far too quiet. A million thoughts and fears and dread and overwhelming sorrow about what might have been before she ever took her first breath ran through my head. She was so . . . tiny. It seemed like all of her could fit into my two hands as she was suctioned and rubbed with bunny-patterned towels.
And then a second later, she said hello to this big new world with a scream and a cry, saying how furious she was to no longer be in the warm, safe place of her mom’s belly, but instead under a blazing bright light, with countless strangers looking directly at her tiny naked body, quickly becoming pink as she breathed new energy and life into her lungs. She had ten little fingers with the longest, sharpest razor-like nails and ten stubby toes, just like Fred Flintstone and Barney Rubble. It’s funny what you think of in those dire moments once they become not so dire. Somehow, at that moment, all I could imagine was the “tink-a-tink-a-tink” from the cartoons I’d watched so many years ago.
I’d been waiting nearly forty years for her to come into my life. My dreams about being a dad had been with me for as long as I could remember, but hidden so deeply away, imagining a mini-me who would follow me around, someone I could help grow and guide, someone who I could take on trips and hikes and maybe even share my different race experiences with. Shoot, I’d even made a point to wear my Ironman Arizona finisher shirt for her birth because it was important for me to introduce myself to her properly—because you never get a second chance to make a first impression. With her, Michelle and I would become a family. Not just a husband and wife, but now three, tying us together, carrying forward forever in an overwhelmingly scary and yet awesome way.
We’d known she was going to be a girl several months earlier. “The ultrasound looks like you probably will be having a girl,” the little pink xeroxed sheet of paper told us when we asked her sex.
How absolutely noncommittal, I thought to myself when we opened the envelope to read the results. But it didn’t matter. I was going to be a dad. Each morning I’d wake up early to cuddle more with her mom, putting my hand on her belly, feeling the baby move inside. I was in awe as I felt an arm, a foot, or an elbow push out, someone who I didn’t know who would soon be here in this crazy world. On race day in Arizona the previous November, I’d carried her ultrasound picture with me, saying, “I love you, baby girl” and looking at the grainy digital image, really having no idea what it meant to be a parent, how I would be willing to sacrifice everything and anything for her, even my own life in the years to come.
“Say hi to your daughter,” the nurse said to me, having wrapped Natalie tightly in a blanket, the little beanie saying “I’m a Swedish baby” so big for her head that it squished her ears and almost covered her eyes.
First, I moved to her mom. “I love you,” I whispered. “You did it.” Tears flowed down both our faces. This moment seemed to be preordained by both our fathers’ deaths the few years before, the baby born just hours before my own dad’s birthday, close enough to remember him, but unique enough for her to celebrate on her own. And that’s when I held her, looked down into her amazingly deep, powerful blue eyes, and fell in love for the first time, unconditional, no judgment, no analysis. Just love.
More and more equipment rolled in behind me on that cold floor, each with lights and buzzers and more cords, rain pelting down on the dark window in Seattle’s Swedish Hospital on a February evening. I couldn’t even begin to think or process the whirlwind. But it was obvious the baby was stuck, and time was running short.
I nodded, trying to breathe, though nothing seeming to matter. There would be no cutting of the cord, no baby on her mom’s chest, no magical moment when we would hear her announce her entrance into her new world with a cry, telling us how unhappy she was. This wasn’t how it was supposed to be. Instead, machines beeped, incubators were plugged in, the doctor asked for different tools, and nothing seemed to make a difference as they tried to pull Natalie out and I wondered how many more seconds before we’re rushed to the OR because the clock was ticking. And then, with a twist and a turn, a teeny, little purple face with hair started to emerge, looking angrier than a grumpy old man, the umbilical cord looped around her neck.
Slowly, delicately, Dr. Johansen lifted the cord up and around her head, and the baby girl slid on out. Her scowling eyes wondered what the hell was going on as she was transferred straight to another series of doctors at the warming table across the room. It was far too quiet. A million thoughts and fears and dread and overwhelming sorrow about what might have been before she ever took her first breath ran through my head. She was so . . . tiny. It seemed like all of her could fit into my two hands as she was suctioned and rubbed with bunny-patterned towels.
And then a second later, she said hello to this big new world with a scream and a cry, saying how furious she was to no longer be in the warm, safe place of her mom’s belly, but instead under a blazing bright light, with countless strangers looking directly at her tiny naked body, quickly becoming pink as she breathed new energy and life into her lungs. She had ten little fingers with the longest, sharpest razor-like nails and ten stubby toes, just like Fred Flintstone and Barney Rubble. It’s funny what you think of in those dire moments once they become not so dire. Somehow, at that moment, all I could imagine was the “tink-a-tink-a-tink” from the cartoons I’d watched so many years ago.
I’d been waiting nearly forty years for her to come into my life. My dreams about being a dad had been with me for as long as I could remember, but hidden so deeply away, imagining a mini-me who would follow me around, someone I could help grow and guide, someone who I could take on trips and hikes and maybe even share my different race experiences with. Shoot, I’d even made a point to wear my Ironman Arizona finisher shirt for her birth because it was important for me to introduce myself to her properly—because you never get a second chance to make a first impression. With her, Michelle and I would become a family. Not just a husband and wife, but now three, tying us together, carrying forward forever in an overwhelmingly scary and yet awesome way.
We’d known she was going to be a girl several months earlier. “The ultrasound looks like you probably will be having a girl,” the little pink xeroxed sheet of paper told us when we asked her sex.
How absolutely noncommittal, I thought to myself when we opened the envelope to read the results. But it didn’t matter. I was going to be a dad. Each morning I’d wake up early to cuddle more with her mom, putting my hand on her belly, feeling the baby move inside. I was in awe as I felt an arm, a foot, or an elbow push out, someone who I didn’t know who would soon be here in this crazy world. On race day in Arizona the previous November, I’d carried her ultrasound picture with me, saying, “I love you, baby girl” and looking at the grainy digital image, really having no idea what it meant to be a parent, how I would be willing to sacrifice everything and anything for her, even my own life in the years to come.
“Say hi to your daughter,” the nurse said to me, having wrapped Natalie tightly in a blanket, the little beanie saying “I’m a Swedish baby” so big for her head that it squished her ears and almost covered her eyes.
First, I moved to her mom. “I love you,” I whispered. “You did it.” Tears flowed down both our faces. This moment seemed to be preordained by both our fathers’ deaths the few years before, the baby born just hours before my own dad’s birthday, close enough to remember him, but unique enough for her to celebrate on her own. And that’s when I held her, looked down into her amazingly deep, powerful blue eyes, and fell in love for the first time, unconditional, no judgment, no analysis. Just love.
Paul Weigel is a father, a six-time Ironman triathlete, a college professor, and a self-described professional dabbler. A lover of the outdoors and hiking, he spent much of his life in the Pacific Northwest, finishing countless races and climbing many mountains, including Mt. Rainier, Mt. St. Helens, and Mt. Adams. Now living in Arizona, he is exploring different ventures while checking things off his bucket list with regularity. But his real passion, and his real inspiration, is creating unforgettable memories with his daughter, who is now a teen.