Palatine woman, stricken with brain tumor, runs to support research
To Jen McDevitt, running is confirmation she's alive.
Another five miles and the brain tumor won't come back, she tells herself in between breaths.
Sadly, the 35-year-old Palatine woman learned in October that her tumor had in fact returned. But don't expect that to stop McDevitt, who took up running after her brain cancer diagnosis in 2003 - eight weeks after her only child, Jack, was born.
She's since completed seven marathons in Chicago and New York, several while she was receiving chemotherapy treatments.
Though initially given just three years to live, she's become a visible advocate for people with the disease and continues a fight that was recognized last month at an awards gala in Washington, D.C.
"Knowing that someone going through treatment sees me as a glimmer of hope helps me live," McDevitt said. "And maybe doctors will see me living beyond my sentence as a reason for more awareness and research."
Because she began a particularly heavy regimen of chemo late last year, McDevitt made the heartbreaking decision to sit out the 2009 Chicago Marathon and cheer on her husband, Glen, from the sidelines.
"I knew that if I tried to train and then was unable to run, it would emotionally and mentally devastate me," said McDevitt, who, however, ran the Chicago Half Marathon in September.
In March, McDevitt spoke in front of a Congressional committee in an effort to get Food and Drug Administration approval for an experimental brain tumor drug known as Avastin. She's treated at the Preston Robert Tisch Brain Tumor Clinic at Duke University Medical Center, which studied the drug and helped pick up McDevitt's $28,000 monthly tab for taking the drug pre-FDA approval.
McDevitt, who works full time at a suburban hospital prepping patients for surgery, was also named to the board of directors of The Tug McGraw Foundation. They recognized her and four other honorees at the Country United symposium and black-tie gala in November.
The event is put on by the foundation, the Henry M. Jackson Foundation for the Advancement of Military Medicine and country music stars Tim McGraw and Faith Hill, who also performed.
She also focused on organizing her second annual Joggin for the Noggin Fun Run/Walk 5K in Palatine last August, which drew 850 participants and raised about $45,000 for Tug McGraw and Duke. She hopes the 2010 event will attract more than 1,000 people.
Meanwhile, McDevitt takes daily low doses of chemo and will soon return to North Carolina for another doctor's appointment. She had surgery in the fall to remove the new tumor, and it'll be a couple more months before the results are known.
She'll also begin training for the 2010 marathon.
"I'm not a fast runner and I walk a great deal," McDevitt said. "But I still cross the finish line."
Go to jogginforthenoggin.com for more information and contributing to McDevitt's cause.