This story I am about to share really is not mine; it is my family's story, and it is still very much ongoing.
My parents are David and Sally, and I am the middle child between my two brothers, Drew and Zach. We all live in Mt. Pleasant, a town right next to Charleston, South Carolina. Us "kids" (we're all in our 30s now) were born and raised here.
I was diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) on October 25, 1996. A lot of people know it as "childhood" leukemia since it is more commonly found in children. I was seven years old and in the first grade at the time. Beating cancer involved nearly three years of chemotherapy, both outpatient and inpatient, and I could not have done it all without the amazing team at the MUSC Children's Hospital in downtown Charleston. I also owe my life to all the family and friends who supported us and prayed for me to get better.
In 1998, when I was still going through treatment, my mom joined Blood Cancer United’s Team In Training (TNT) to walk in the Rock & Roll San Diego Marathon. She walked it in my honor. I still remember waiting on one street with my dad and brothers for my mom to march by, and we all ran out there when we saw her so she could give us a quick, sweaty hug before she kept on going.
I successfully completed cancer treatment in June 1999, but this is really just the start of our story. I consider my fight against cancer to be the sort of “flagship event” that would change the trajectory of my family members’ lives because if you really, REALLY know my family, then you know we have what has been referred to as "a family curse."
To summarize, in the years following my finishing chemo, my younger brother Zach was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes, sometimes called juvenile diabetes because it more regularly occurs in children. Zach was in the first grade at the time. To avoid any confusion, type 1 is an autoimmune disease where the body attacks and destroys insulin-producing cells, leading to a complete lack of insulin. It is treatable, but not curable.
Flash forward a few more years, Drew was a graduating senior in high school who had just found out that he had been accepted into Clemson University, when we found out that he, too, had type 1 diabetes.
Suddenly, the illnesses started coming at us, almost on a yearly basis. Our younger cousin from my dad’s side of the family was also diagnosed with type 1. Drew was still in college when we learned he had Crohn’s disease, a chronic inflammatory bowel disease that causes inflammation of the digestive tract. I was about to graduate from Winthrop University when we learned Zach had ulcerative colitis, another chronic inflammatory bowel disease that causes ulcers in the lining of the colon.
The number of diseases in my immediate family outnumber the children.
After Zach was diagnosed with ulcerative colitis, things seemed to quiet down a little bit on the illness front.
But then we got to 2025, and the real reason I want to do Team In Training . . .
I think everyone in my family started 2025 without too much concern. My whole family still resides in Mt. Pleasant. Zach and I have been roommates for several years now, and we share a two-bedroom condo. In the neighborhood across the street are Drew and his wife Katie, their two kids, and their pretty golden retriever, Buoy. Mom and Dad are only 10 minutes away.
So, we have had this idyllic little compound going on for a while now. We gather every Sunday night at my parents’ house for dinner. We love on my niece and nephew. We like our beer and our wine, and we spend our summers bobbing around my parents’ pool for hours on end. But even before this past New Year's, things were “off” with Zach. He had zero appetite and started losing weight. He was scheduled for a biopsy in February to make sure he did not have lymphoma, though it seemed highly doubtful that he had cancer.
In mid-February, I received a call from Zach telling me that he had checked himself into the hospital earlier that day because he had spent the entire night throwing up. He was put in the ICU and basically was told by the hospital that they were not going to let him go until they got to the bottom of what was making him so sick. Zach has been hospitalized before for ulcerative colitis flare-ups, but this was quickly ruled out. They started him on a series of tests, with his doctor telling my parents that they were looking at a very strong indication of lymphoma.
Zach was in the hospital for about a week, and a series of inconclusive tests eventually brought us to a diagnosis of HL. Zach was released from the hospital with a plan to start chemotherapy a couple of weeks out, all outpatient, once every two weeks for six months. He should be done in September.
I remember how chemo makes you feel. It sucks. The one “good” thing (and I say that very loosely) about being a young kid with cancer is that I did not know to be scared or angry or stressed at the time. My parents carried that burden for me. Zach knows what is going on, so it is wearing on him in all sorts of ways.
Cancer is tough, but Zach is tougher. We love you, bud!
In March, I was already toying with the idea of joining Blood Cancer United and doing a walk or something in Zach’s honor, like my mom did for me in San Diego in 1998. Fun fact: this year, I am actually turning the same age my mom was when I first got sick. (Can you imagine . . . 36 years old, three kids under the age of 10, and one of them has cancer?)
I started asking my mom questions about how she got involved in that particular marathon she did; she told me it was through the Team In Training program, a term I have not heard since the 1990s. I got on Google and learned TNT is still very much a thing, and it is not just limited to walks, there are other endurance events like hiking! However, with me being busy with work in March and preparing for an upcoming hiking trip to Utah in mid-April, I decided to revisit the idea later.
I did not know I liked hiking until three years ago, when I went out to Utah and Arizona with three girlfriends. We spent two nights in Zion National Park and did the Narrows and Angels Landing, both challenging hikes in completely different ways. We did one night in Page, Arizona, and kayaked into Antelope Canyon. We spent another night in Sedona and checked out Subway Cave and Devil's Bridge. Hands down, one of the greatest trips I have ever been on, so I was pretty excited to go back out to Utah this past April. I saw Salt Lake City for the first time as well as Bryce Canyon (gorgeous, highly recommend), and then headed to Zion National Park for a three-night stay that included tackling the Narrows and Angels Landing for a second time. I also got to do the Canyon Overlook trail and the Emerald Pools via the Kayenta Trail.
I came back to South Carolina still on a pretty big high from hiking. I love Charleston and think it’s a beautiful area, but we do not have quite the views you would find out west.
Since I have been to Zion twice, I really want to go to a national park I have never been to before. Yosemite National Park is high up on that list.
Still chasing that high after coming home from my trip, I went back to the TNT website to look at upcoming endurance events. I clicked on the list of hikes and, lo and behold, there is a hike in Yosemite scheduled for June 13, 2026. It really, really felt like the stars were aligning, yâ’ll. My brother and I are both blood cancer fighters. This year, I am turning the same age my mom was when I got sick. I want to go to Yosemite. What a cool idea to go hiking AND make it mean something, right?
Flash forward to today (July 25, 2025), Zach is on the tail end of his chemotherapy, and we are hoping for good news following a PET scan when he is done. I should be hearing from my TNT coach within another month or so, and I will be well on my way working toward a trip with other like-minded people who all very much want cancer to "take a hike."
Monica
acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL)
