I was diagnosed with Acute Myeloid Leukemia July 2011. And was told without a life saving stem cell transplant I wasn’t going to live the year. After nearly a year of in and out of the hospital including my cancer relapsing February of 2012; I had a life saving stem cell transplant May 3rd 2012.
A chemotherapy induced brain injury and a virus that caused spinal chord trauma during that year left me permanently medically disabled. But miraculously the stem cell transplant worked!! We found out in the spring of 2013 that my stem cell donor was an American Naval Serviceman named Nathan who was in Japan when he saved my life!!
Later that summer a friend took me and my son to Alaska and ran a marathon for me with the Leukemia lymphoma society! It changed my life. I came home from that trip and bought a pair of running shoes and stared running in spite of my ongoing health concerns. I started running big distances and my first marathon was at Disney! January of 2015.
The following year I was approved to run the Boston marathon as an athlete with disabilities! That was incredible. I ran Boston 3x from 2016-18, Chicago New York and Disney again in 2018.
In 2019 I finally got to meet Nathan!! I ran 7 marathons in 7 years waiting to meet him. Disney did a video of us meeting!! Life is beautiful.
April of 2022 was my 10th marathon in 10 years after my life saving stem cell transplant!! My 4th time going to Boston in person!! I ran Berlin in September of 2022, my 4th world major marathon ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️.
I walked away from a horrific car wreck in April and ran a marathon two weeks after that.
I’m in the process of running every single day for an entire year for friends fighting cancer. Marathon 13 was October 22nd!! Marathon 14 was in January at Disney!!
Boyd Dunleavey, Canada