Terry Fox

[Locke]

All of the Canadians on this forum will be very familiar with the story of this courageous young man but I thought I'd share it with the rest of the world. It gives me hope and inspiration when confronting my hair loss and many other challenges in life (especially long distance running!). I hope you find it to be equally inspiring.

At 18 years of age, Terry Fox was diagnosed with bone cancer and had his leg amputated 6 inches above his knee. During his time in the cancer ward at the hospital he saw the suffering children went through and that many of them had given up against cancer.

When he left the hospital he decided he was going to make a difference in the fight against cancer for all those who were still suffering. He decided he was going to run across Canada, with one leg.

He trained for 18 months, running 5,000 km. Finally he decided to embark on his Marathon of Hope. He started at the Atlantic ocean in Newfoundland (Eastern Canada) and headed west to his home in British Columbia.

He ran 26 miles (42 kilometers)...a marathon....every single day...for 143 days...on one leg.

Unfortunately by the time he reached Thunder Bay, Ontario the cancer had metastasized to his lungs and he had to stop his Marathon of Hope. Sadly, he passed away at the age of 22.

His initial goal was to raise $1 for every Canadian (24 million) but each year in Canada and around the world the Terry Fox run is held and has raised more than $500 million in Terry's name.

Here's a great documentary about him. Some of the things I've stated in this story are quotes from the documentary. Steve Nash has directed a documentary on Terry Fox called "Into the Wind' airing on ESPN.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xjgTlCTluPA

Moral of the Story
The moral I want to get across is that just like in Terry's case, you cannot change fate. But you can change how you react to it. It's written in our genes that we are going to lose our hair, just as it was in Terry's that he was going to get cancer (not exactly a fair comparison because it could have been due to mutation and not inheritance but I digress).

Do you think Terry cared about how people thought he looked? That they would view him as a cripple or a lesser being? It didn't matter to Terry, he knew what he wanted to do in life and he had the utmost confidence doing it.

I hope this story can teach you, as it has taught me, that if you approach everything in life with confidence, no matter what you look like, people will respect you.

Life's too short to be worrying about what we look like. We should be out in the world living our lives and meeting attractive women! If Terry didn't let cancer and a leg amputation stop him from accomplishing something so amazing, then really, what excuse do those of us suffering from hairloss have?

[jooder]

Its stories like these that some people will understand and some wont. Those who 'get it' realise that hair is just hair - yes baldness is annoying, can get you down and can dent your confidence.......but its hair.
There are some people in the world who wont give up no matter what odds are stacked against them...... then there are some who yelp constantly about lifes unfairness. There are solutions for baldness - HT's, medications or just shaving it down. So pick your solution and do it 100 %.
For some people there will never be a solution to the difficulties they face, but that wont stop them fighting the odds.

[Fixed by 35]

Yeah, but you completely miss the point. Terry was able to do that because he had sympathy and no one cared about his appearance because he was bravely fighting a disease.

If I, on the other hand, decided to circumnavigate the globe to highlight the psychological distress of baldness, I'd get laughed at.

That's the point that you don't seem to get with these people. Yes, they're remarkable, but they're totally unrelated to our situation. They're people who are placed in a very difficult situation, with which the public sympathise, who are able to do remarkable things through this public sympathy. We, on the other hand, are people put in a difficult situation who have no such recourse. We are stuck with a silent anger the mention of which will lead to ridicule.

Therefore, are situation is incomparable to theirs. It's like saying we should get over baldness because the trenches in the Great War were muddy.

[jooder]

Fixed by 35 = Mr negativity. Even when stories like these are told...... it will still never, ever, ever be worse than baldness...... you are such a victim its unreal. Go get some psychological help.... you really, really need it. Think its time i left the forum again for a while....... i will leave you to your pity party.

[Fixed by 35]

The stories are incomparable. It makes no more sense to tell me to be grateful its only hair and not a limb that I've lost than it would be to go into a chemo ward and console them by saying 'hey, at least you're not in Africa dying of AIDS.'

[Don'tDoIt]

I have to admit that I chuckled out loud at the image of Fixed by 35 circumnavigating the globe in the name of hair loss. Fixed by 35, you could borrow a page from the Terry Fox playbook.

Just ask each American to donate one dollar. That will give us about 310 million dollars for research to cure male pattern baldness. C'mon, Fixed by 35, start running!

[Fixed by 35]

I could make $310m on the money markets rather faster than I could run around the world!

[KeepTheHair]

Cool story but is there any point to posting it here? I don't really get it.