It is the first night of the Sundance Film Festival 2016 in Park, City, Utah. I am with my mom, dad, and older sister. I am excited to attend my first film, the premiere of Other People. My mom and dad sit in the first row of seats in the SUV, left and right, respectively, while my sister and I sit in the second. I sit in the right seat. We never make it to the film.

It takes every ion of concentration to attempt to see past the sea of oncoming headlight waves that come crashing into the windshield of our black Ford Expedition Uber. Even from the back seat, the trippy light show feels surreally immersive. I am not on psychedelics though. Or any drug, for that matter. What I am experiencing is something far more perilous. What proceeds to happen changes the course of my life in such a drastic way that it breaks me, physically, mentally, and emotionally. But if you’re sick long enough, your body begins to fight back, learn how to immunize. Immobilize against not only your ailment, but also against the narcissists of the world who attempt to further break you.

The Uber nears the theater when my head violently jerks back in my seat, my jaw dislocates, my eyes roll into the back of my head, my back arches unnaturally jaggedly, and my left arm reaches towards my sister’s headrest so as to subconsciously hold onto an inanimate object, my blindsided body fighting the convulsions. A choking sound begins to emit from my throat as it closes up and my lungs begin to shut down, the oxygen fleeing from my brain like Roman Polanski from the United States in 1978.

My sister screams. My mom and dad yell at the Uber driver to stop the car square inside the entrance into the parking lot of Eccles Theatre. The driver pumps the breaks, and my mom, dad, and my sister run around the car to my door, sobbing, swearing, shitting their fucking pants. My dad pulls me out of the car first, laying me on my back against the black ice as I continue to violently convulse. My muscles contract at a much higher rate of strength than one could ever achieve consciously, effectively crushing my bones. I suffer three fractured ribs, three bruised ribs, a broken left shoulder (snapped completely in half at the socket), a severed-in-half bicep muscle at the hand of one of the serrated edges of the broken shoulder, a severed labrum, a severed rotator cuff, several snapped tendons, a sprained back, a sprained neck, and six pulled ligaments in my jaw.

When I come to, I am tightly strapped to a stretcher, two paramedics and a seizure alert dog hovering over me, the canine companion licking the white, foam-like spittle that had formed around my mouth off of my face.

All I can repeat is, “What happened?”

“You had a seizure.” One of the paramedics reply.

What I experienced in the car with the headlights was an intense aura. The kind of aura one experiences before a catastrophic tonic clonic seizure.

I was really looking forward to seeing that film.

What does the average person do after something like that? A near-death experience and an out-of-left-field diagnosis? I wouldn’t know. I’m not your average human being.

On one side of my family, I come from Armenian Genocide and Hamidian Massacres survivors, who overcame racism, prejudice, slaughter, and continued discrimination to thrive overseas. My grandfather, orphaned at a young age – a St. Mary’s Hall-of-Famer drafted in the NFL in the 16th round (144th overall) for the 1941 Chicago Cardinals (before the franchise moved to St. Louis, then, finally Arizona) which he turned down due to United States Coast Guard Military service duty – helped build the Golden Gate Bridge and, later on, a successful flower shop with my grandmother. On the other side of my family, I am the first cousin, twice removed (his grandmother is my great-great-grandmother) of Steve Roland Prefontaine. Steve was a strong-willed person who never, under any circumstances, gave up. I may not have inherited his running genes, but I inherited his running drive. And his insistence on never, ever giving up. On both sides of my family, it is in my DNA to persevere. To not only survive, but to also thrive, especially amidst adversity.

After my reconstructive shoulder surgery, I began running to combat my anxiety and depression – the seizure meds had a profound affect on my mood, at first. My epilepsy journey was only beginning.

In 2018, I switched to a seizure medication that caused me to gain 80 pounds in 4 months. Gaining weight is nothing to be ashamed about. However, I am a genetically leaner person, and the rapid weight gain caused alarming mental and physical health issues such as mood swings, high blood pressure, and micro muscle tears in my legs from running. Once I switched off of that medication and finally found the right seizure medication, I continued to run, as I always have, and the weight naturally dropped – I lost 100 pounds over the next 4 months from running. I figured, why stop there? So I signed up for the Walt Disney World Marathon on January 12, 2020. After four months of rigorous training for the marathon, I suffered a tonic clonic seizure two weeks before my race in December of 2019. Although it wasn’t as bad as my last seizure, I was physically and mentally drained, and every fiber of my being wanted nothing more than to lay in bed and cancel everything I had trained for – to give up – but that isn’t me. I looked to my heritage – my ancestry – for motivation, and willed myself out of bed and onto that plane to Florida, where I completed the first marathon of my life.

During the pandemic, I ran an additional marathon, four half marathons, and set several 10k PRs. I’ve run 100 miles or more every month of this year. I wanted to cap off my year in running (1,325.5 miles over 228 activities at a measly 8:56 average pace – I wasn’t kidding about not inheriting Pre’s speedy gifts!) in some grand fashion by running a third marathon, but I learned two valuable lesson: 1) My grand exit is this article – sharing my journey in hopes to inspire others, and, 2) Don’t run half marathons or greater distances without a proper way to hydrate regularly throughout your given or chosen course. I ran a half marathon on December 6, 2020 – my second in just over a month, in between setting a PR for a 10k and running an almost three-day marathon the weekend prior for my birthday – without drinking any fluids during the run. I developed a fever that night, and suffered a minor seizure from dehydration. Lesson learned. Personally, it is difficult for me to hydrate during virtual races. Alas, I will wait until the vaccines for COVID-19 are widely dispersed, the virus is under control, and it is safe to have public races again to run my next marathon. Whenever that is, I will be marathon-ready, maintaining my unquenchable thirst for 100 miles per month. Every month. Until my legs give in. Three months into 2021, I have kept that goal, already running 308.6 miles as of March 21, 2021, and four half marathons and counting in the month of March. I’m coining it “Marathon March,” for those who’d like to participate.

I’d like to dedicate every step, shredded piece of cartilage from pounding against the pavement, drop of blood, sweat, tears, and race I ran this year to my dear, late Grandma Isabelle, Pre, the more than 4,000 Armenians who were senselessly slaughtered at the hands of Azeri aggression in 2020, the Armenians still suffering in Artsakh, world leaders and those who’ve abuse their power – your behavior influenced the world to make different, better choices, my detractors, who motivated me to run faster, and to my seizure alert Samoyed, Lupo, who, training with me on almost every run, may possibly be the most in shape dog in the world. I could not have survived these diagnoses, the 180 pound weight fluctuation in eight months, the commitment to my goals, and combatting the vicissitudes of life without him.