Running the Race With RA
Reviewed by Poonam Sachdev on February 18, 2022
Video Transcript
CHULWON PARK: I'm Chulwon,
and I'm from Birmingham,
Alabama,
and I've had
rheumatoid arthritis for about
12 years.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
I was born in South Korea in '82, and grew up there until 1994, when my family moved to the United States. I would say that I immediately fell in love with it-- the people, the culture, the southern hospitality.
When I became of age, I wanted to serve in the military, not only to serve my country, but also to advance my career. I wanted to be a surgeon, and I was going to be a field medic to get some experience to do that.
And I signed up with the US Navy and got into boot camp, and somehow I just kept getting injured during the PT. Specifically the running is what I couldn't quite get. And I just kept getting-- I just kept falling, which just kept leading to injury. Yeah, it just wasn't happening for me. It just was not happening.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
I was discharged, and I wanted to know what was wrong with me. I was starting to get pain in other parts of my body, mostly joints. I went to various different doctors and finally found one that took a offhand chance and tested me for rheumatoid factor, which sent me to a rheumatologist who then confirmed that I had rheumatoid arthritis. And it took me two years after getting discharged to get that diagnosis.
It was pretty difficult. I put my school on hold. I worked, did a lot of drinking and smoking, and just didn't care. Just, I did stuff to just kind of make myself feel better. But it didn't make me feel better. It actually made everything worse.
My low point was when my then-wife suggested that I should apply for disability because I was kind of useless. And that was kind of the point when I thought to myself, wow, like I'm not ready for that. I'm not ready to throw in the towel. So I quit smoking and quit drinking. And I started to take a systemic approach to running. What was I doing wrong, or what about my condition that was keeping me from being able to run? I thought running was an innate thing. That's something that you're just born with. But I found out that's not always the case, and I'm one of those cases.
In the boot camp, they always told us heel to toe, heel to toe, heel to toe, for running. And so I was just smashing my heels to the ground, which was causing a lot of impact on my joints. And once I switched to landing on my mid-foot, I was able to rely on my muscles rather than my joints for shock absorption.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
And even though it wasn't very fast, I just kept doing it, and ran my first marathon six months after starting to run.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
Thinking back to the boot camp when I couldn't even run a mile and a half, it's hard to fathom how far I had come, how hard I had to fight, the pain of failure, the pain of arthritis, and I just fell in love with it. I fell in love with it.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
I fell in love with it so much that I started a running streak in 2014. And this weekend, I will hit 1,800 days of running every single day.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
Having RA and having my running streak have taught me a lot about what can be done with consistency. You don't have to accept the status quo. You can do something to better yourself, even though it seems so hard at the time. With those lessons learned, I decided to go back to school and finish my degree, and I'll be graduating at the end of this semester, and I'm pretty excited about it.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
[MUSIC PLAYING]
I was born in South Korea in '82, and grew up there until 1994, when my family moved to the United States. I would say that I immediately fell in love with it-- the people, the culture, the southern hospitality.
When I became of age, I wanted to serve in the military, not only to serve my country, but also to advance my career. I wanted to be a surgeon, and I was going to be a field medic to get some experience to do that.
And I signed up with the US Navy and got into boot camp, and somehow I just kept getting injured during the PT. Specifically the running is what I couldn't quite get. And I just kept getting-- I just kept falling, which just kept leading to injury. Yeah, it just wasn't happening for me. It just was not happening.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
I was discharged, and I wanted to know what was wrong with me. I was starting to get pain in other parts of my body, mostly joints. I went to various different doctors and finally found one that took a offhand chance and tested me for rheumatoid factor, which sent me to a rheumatologist who then confirmed that I had rheumatoid arthritis. And it took me two years after getting discharged to get that diagnosis.
It was pretty difficult. I put my school on hold. I worked, did a lot of drinking and smoking, and just didn't care. Just, I did stuff to just kind of make myself feel better. But it didn't make me feel better. It actually made everything worse.
My low point was when my then-wife suggested that I should apply for disability because I was kind of useless. And that was kind of the point when I thought to myself, wow, like I'm not ready for that. I'm not ready to throw in the towel. So I quit smoking and quit drinking. And I started to take a systemic approach to running. What was I doing wrong, or what about my condition that was keeping me from being able to run? I thought running was an innate thing. That's something that you're just born with. But I found out that's not always the case, and I'm one of those cases.
In the boot camp, they always told us heel to toe, heel to toe, heel to toe, for running. And so I was just smashing my heels to the ground, which was causing a lot of impact on my joints. And once I switched to landing on my mid-foot, I was able to rely on my muscles rather than my joints for shock absorption.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
And even though it wasn't very fast, I just kept doing it, and ran my first marathon six months after starting to run.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
Thinking back to the boot camp when I couldn't even run a mile and a half, it's hard to fathom how far I had come, how hard I had to fight, the pain of failure, the pain of arthritis, and I just fell in love with it. I fell in love with it.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
I fell in love with it so much that I started a running streak in 2014. And this weekend, I will hit 1,800 days of running every single day.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
Having RA and having my running streak have taught me a lot about what can be done with consistency. You don't have to accept the status quo. You can do something to better yourself, even though it seems so hard at the time. With those lessons learned, I decided to go back to school and finish my degree, and I'll be graduating at the end of this semester, and I'm pretty excited about it.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
