Team Running for Cover: Meet Elana Schwam
The 114th Boston Marathon commences on Monday, April 16th, and IMPACT Melanoma is once again proud to present our team, Running for Cover, which is comprised of a dedicated group of runners that come from different backgrounds and levels of running experience. Each of our runners share a passion for our cause – which is to spread awareness and prevention initiatives with regard to the incidences of melanoma around the United States, and, with our lead, the word.
Many of Running for Cover’s team members are survivors, family members of survivors, or a person who has lost a loved one to melanoma. Together, along with our partnership with the Boston Athletic Association, we’ve been able to make great IMPACT over the years raising in excess of $1.9 million, which has gone to directly benefit IMPACT Melanoma’s mission of prevention, education, support and advocacy in the fight against melanoma.
As mentioned, each of our team members have unique reasons as to why they’re contributing efforts to Running for Cover, and, as such, we’re highlighting a handful of them in support of their run, and their campaign to raise necessary funds.
With that in mind, please join us in welcoming and thanking, Elana Schwam!
IMPACT Melanoma: How’d you learn about IMPACT Melanoma and Team Running for Cover?
Elana Schwam: The circumstances in which I learned about IMPACT Melanoma (back when it was Melanoma Foundation of New England) were pretty unfortunate. I was diagnosed with stage 3B melanoma in June of 2016, which came as a complete surprise because at the time I didn’t actually have any concerning moles on my body. I had noticed a small firm nodule under my arm that had been growing for about 3 months. Long story short, several healthcare professionals told me that this nodule was likely benign (non-cancerous) and that I had nothing to worry about. At the time I was trying to combat hypochondriac tendencies of first year nursing students, but I knew this nodule was not normal since it was firm, fixed, and growing. So I took matters into my own hands and decided to have the nodule removed. It was at the follow-up appointment that I found out that this nodule was actually a cancerous tumor that had taken over one of my lymph nodes and tested positive for malignant melanoma. To say I was shocked would be an understatement. The fact that the melanoma was already in my lymph nodes meant it was stage 3 of the disease and the surgeon immediately scheduled me to have a CT scan of my abdomen, chest, and pelvis to see if the melanoma had spread anywhere else. While I was drinking the contrast prep for the scans I was Googling melanoma like a mad woman and one of the pages I found was the info and support pages on IMPACT melanoma’s website. These support pages helped me figure out the questions I needed to ask my doctor and future oncologist and I saw that they had support groups for melanoma patients in New England, so this was already a great relief for me.
The day after my initial diagnosis, I went to visit my dermatologist to see if we could figure out where this melanoma came from. I had no history of melanoma, or so we thought. After going through my records, we figured out that I had a suspicious mole removed 6 years ago on my back that was called a “spitz nevus.” Spitz nevi are generally benign, but can sometimes act aggressive in children, so the standard care is to remove them with a wide local excision, just in case. I had the procedure, they had clear margins (no cells left in the surrounding tissue) and I went on with my life. Luckily my dermatologist still had my old skin sample saved from this biopsy so we sent it to MGH and Dana Farber so they could do their own biopsy and analysis. It turned out that I was misdiagnosed 6 years ago and the mole on my back was actually melanoma all along!
Luckily they did not find any more melanoma in any of my organs. However, melanoma is aggressive and at my stage there is a high risk of recurrence, even after surgery removes all the tumor and cancer cells, so I decided to have adjuvant treatment with immunotherapy, which is standard for stage 3 melanoma. My amazing oncology team at MGH helped me and my family every step of the way.
The next year was not easy: I had another surgery to remove more skin and tissue from my back (original melanoma) and under my arm (where they found the new tumor). I went through 2 different adjuvant immunotherapy treatments in an effort to prevent the aggressive melanoma from coming back. First I received infusions of interferon, 2-3 hours a day, 5 days a week for 6 weeks. I felt like I had a nearly constant mega flu, and I had to pause in the middle of treatment to make sure my liver didn’t get damaged (due to the drug). In the middle of this treatment, a new study came out that a different immunotherapy treatment, called yervoy (ipilimumab) was more effective but had higher chance of severe toxicities (major side effects). It was tough, but I knew I had to do it. I received 2 infusions of Yervoy before I had an autoimmune reaction and liver injury that caused extremely high fevers of up to 104 degrees F, for a week as well as weird headaches (Thanksgiving 2016 was very sweaty and cold for me). Because of the side effects we had to stop treatment, (and go on high dose steroids for several weeks) to get my immune system to stop attacking my healthy organs. However, we are hopeful that the immunotherapy also found any microscopic melanoma cells and attacked those too. Since then I have full body CT scans and brain MRI’s every 3 to 4 months (for the next 8-10 years) to make sure the melanoma has not come back. I am currently at no evidence of disease (NED) status and hope to stay that way forever!
IM: What made you decide to get involved and commit to a spot on the team? What does said spot mean to you?
Schwam: Growing up on the outskirts of Boston (in Westborough) I watched the marathon every year on TV. After I graduated college and moved out to Newton and then to Cambridge, I would cheer marathoners on at heartbreak hill every year. Marathon Monday is my favorite day of the year. The runners are SO inspiring. Cheering them on brings me to tears, I mean 26.2 miles is just wow – what an accomplishment. Having been an athlete my whole life, I understand having a desire and drive to reach your goals, and watching those thousands of runners do it every year made me emotional for strangers! Needless to say, running the Boston Marathon has been on my bucket list for as long as I can remember.
Ever since I was diagnosed with Melanoma, I have been passionate about educating others about sun safety. I plan to be a life long advocate for melanoma patients and those affected by it and will dedicate part of my life for supporting organizations that help to reduce the incidence of melanoma, like IMPACT Melanoma. After watching the 2017 Boston Marathon, I thought there has to be a charity that runs in support of melanoma prevention, so I went back to my friend Google and was reacquainted with IMPACT Melanoma. I was so excited there was an opportunity for me to run in support of melanoma prevention – I put a reminder in my calendar to check back when they had applications open for 2018. I have never been so sure about something in my life. I applied in late November and after 3 weeks of anxiety and waiting I found out I was accepted to the team! Obviously having a spot on Team Running for Cover means the world to me after all I’ve been through. I also want to show other cancer survivors that you don’t have to let your melanoma/cancer diagnosis stop you from living your life to the fullest.
IM: How many marathons have you run in the past? What do you take away from these experiences?
Schwam: I have never run any marathons in the past! Can you believe it? The 2018 Boston Marathon will be my first ever marathon. To be honest, I’ve never even run a half marathon. I actually registered to run the Hyannis Half in 2015, but as you know that was the winter we had record breaking snowfall and the race was cancelled a week before.
When I was a sophomore in college I completed a full triathlon (1 mile swim, 22 mile bike ride, and 6 mile run). What I learned from that was do not underestimate the bike ride (laughs). I used my friend’s cheap mountain bike and it was a huge mistake. It was so slow and heavy I had to run it up the steep hills!. It’s been 11 years since I did that triathlon and all I can say is that I know I can do anything if I put in the training time and take care of my body. While I have never run a marathon, I have always enjoyed distance running as a hobby and for my mental health. I am actually a semi-professional ultimate frisbee player. I play for a women’s club team called Boston Brute Squad. We have won 2 National Championships in the last 3 years and will be representing USA in an international competition this coming July. You can learn more about our team by visiting our website – www.brutesquadultimate.com (I am #26). I have played on Brute Squad for 5 seasons and plan to play this year as well (we have to tryout every season). For ultimate frisbee we train quite a lot with 8 hours of practice on the weekends when we don’t have tournaments and 2.5 hours during the week and are expected to train 5 days a week on our own or in workout pods. Being part of Brute Squad is like being part of a family. In addition to my actual family and my fiancé, my teammates on Brute Squad were a huge support to me during the 2016 season while I was having treatment (and I still played at Nationals) and beyond. I also love playing for a dominant all-women’s team. I think it’s so important that young girls and female identifying athletes have role models to look up to and know that they can achieve their dreams through sports. I looked up to all those women I saw running the marathon when I was a little girl, and because of them I thought, ‘hey, I can do that too one day.’
IM: I know it’s hard to predict, but how do you think this particular run will stack up (from a philosophical/humanitarian/or just straight physical point of view)?
Schwam: Since this is my first marathon and it’s in my home city and all my friends and family will be out there cheering for me, and it’s for a cause I care so much about, I think this is going to be something I’ll remember forever! I don’t think anything else will compare (except for maybe that feeling of winning the 2016 club national championship while going through cancer treatment). I get emotional just thinking about it and it keeps me going on those long cold runs. So far I’ve been training for a month and 12 miles is the max distance I have run (two weeks in a row) and by the end it has been a struggle. I know it’s going to be hard, but I have more training to do and I think on Marathon Monday the crowd and the emotion of it all will keep me going no matter what. I am so excited and nervous.
IM: What is your personal stance / battle cry with regard to skin cancer and taking care of one’s skin?
Schwam: I will be graduating from Nurse Practitioner school this May! During my program I was able to do rotations in primary care and dermatology. A major role of a Nurse Practitioner is to promote disease prevention and to educate our patients. That is one of the reasons I am so passionate about running for IMPACT Melanoma; because they are an organization dedicated to reducing the incidence of melanoma by doing just that!
One of the major areas that I am really passionate about is educating adolescents about sun safety and the dangers of indoor tanning. When I was in high school all the girls were going tanning (at indoor salons) before prom. There is a ton of overt and covert pressure on girls and women to be physically attractive, even if it means putting your life at risk. I knew that tanning was bad – my parents had told me the dangers. But all my friends were doing it and when I asked the girl working at the salon, she told me that indoor tanning was ‘way safer than the real sun.’ I was 16 at the time, and that was enough for me to be okay with it. Anyway, if I only went a couple of times, it couldn’t really hurt me right? Wrong. That was all it took for me. The rest of my life I have always worn sunscreen, reapplied, covered up, and now I am even more careful. I wear protective clothing when I am out during dangerous hours, and have a selection of awesome hats and sun shirts to keep me safe. So I preach having fun in the sun, but only with protection. I also like to use Bob Marley as an example of how anyone from any race can be affected by Melanoma. Bob Marley died from an aggressive form of melanoma called acral lentiginous melanoma – a melanoma that forms under your nails or on the palms of your hands or soles of your feet. It is deadly and aggressive and occurs more frequently in African Americans.
IM: What’s your pre-race ritual? Some sort of specific cuisine the night before? Specific stretching routine? Special socks? You tell us!
Schwam: Since this is my first marathon, I don’t really have any pre-race ritual, (laughs). However, like most athletes, I am very superstitious and definitely have my weird wardrobe habits and pre-tournament rituals. For breakfast I love having toast with chunky peanut butter, banana, and honey. I usually only have a few sips of coffee because I am extra sensitive to caffeine. I have a lucky teal sports bra, socks, and a lucky teal headband that I always wear for big ultimate tournaments. The night before a big tournament or game I always visualize certain plays or things I hope to do well (perhaps heartbreak hill) before I go to sleep. I have actually been visualizing before games/tournaments since I was about 9 years old when my dad sat down on my bed the night before the biggest soccer game of my 9 year old life and told me to “visualize greatness.” Then in college in my sports psychology class I learned it was evidence-based and scientifically proven to enhance performance and focus! My dad is a smart guy. In terms of stretching routine, I am a huge fan of foam rolling and using lacrosse balls and water bottles to roll out my legs, feet (plantar fascia), calves, and achilles. Foam rolling will change your life, I swear.
That’s about it! Oh, I also have special pump-up playlists that I curate for each sporting event. Mostly they involve rap music and throwback songs from my college days, and a lot of Anderson Paak.
IM: Further comments?
Schwam: I actually have a blog that I started when I was first diagnosed! I wrote it with a few purposes in mind – to keep family and friends up to date, as a therapeutic way for me to write about my own experience, and to provide a resource for other melanoma fighters and other young adult cancer fighters/survivors. The site is: https://schwamingcancer.wordpress.com/
Also, MGH Cancer center to an interview and published a story about me on their site – http://www.massgeneral.org/cancer/everydayamazing/the-story-project/elana-schwam.aspx
To get involved and make a donation:
Visit Elana’s runner profile here to help her reach her personal goal: www.crowdrise.com/o/en/campaign/impact-melanoma-boston-2018/elanaschwam
Visit our Running for Cover team page here: www.crowdrise.com/o/en/team/impact-melanoma-boston-2018/
