Book by Kerby Gerughty

The Driving Battle

Kerby Gerughty

Dedication This is for any cancer patient struggling with mental health issues.

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

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would like to thank my teachers, Mrs. Parkinson and Mr. Greco, for putting up with me throughout this project. I want to thank my mom for all of the help editing the text of my book. I want to thank my sister Audrey for the graphic design help. My father, for driving me to Livermore for my interviews with Charles. Finally, I want to thank Charles and his family for the opportunity to write this book.

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contents

Preface W

hen thinking about this project I wasn’t sure what I should write about. I don’t know any tech giants or artist that I could write about.

Then, one of my friends talked to me about their cousin who had been diagnosed with cancer. My uncle had been diagnosed the last year and I decided that I would write my book about the relationship between being diagnosed with cancer and being diagnosed with depression. I definitely had struggled throughout this project. I wasn’t sure how I was even going to approach the beast that was the documentary in the beginning. Whether I should start with my interviews or research. I ended up starting with my interviews. I just started writing with a general plan. Words got put on the page without a lot of thought to how the story would unfold. This caused proofreading to be very difficult and take a lot of time.

I also struggled because in the last week of the project I had severe migraines.

This made it very hard to finish the design of the book. I pushed through the pain from the migraine and finished the design of the book. This experience has made me think about the mental pain caused by cancer. Having your own body betray you and not being able to do anything about it is soul-crushing. I was only able to experience a fraction of what it’s like to have cancer. We need to empathize and sympathize with people struggling with diseases like cancer.

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Intro W

ith so many people in the modern world becoming diagnosed with cancer, we hear they are taking up the fight. What is this “fight” or “battle” against? Is it the disease itself, or is it the knowledge that they could die at any time? Is it the damage that a cancer diagnosis has on their psyche? Even when we look at the language used to describe cancer: a war, a battle, or a fight, we see very negative language. When someone is diagnosed with cancer, it is very common for mental health problems to develop. The American Cancer Society estimates that 1 in 4 people diagnosed with cancer is also diagnosed with clinical depression.

Depression can affect them in their daily lives and their recovery.

What can we do to help treat patients with cancer, not just beating the disease but also keeping their mental health intact?

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The Drive

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Charles Gerughty’s love for racing began in 2008 when his father passed away. With some of the money from his father’s estate, he bought his first Chevy Corvette with a red exterior and tan interior. He wanted to buy a Ferrari but couldn’t afford one.

His first experience racing was at the Wednesday night drag races at Sonoma Raceway. He met people there who became his friends, members of his Corvette club, his tax clients and a mix of the three. They all just wanted to have fun on Wednesday nights drag racing. He enjoyed the competition on the drag strip. When he saw the white light after the race (which meant that he won), he loved the huge adrenaline rush that came with it. The burst of pure ecstasy that came with winning was a constant draw to return back to the track and to try to win again.

The specific type of drag racing Charles enjoyed is known as bracket drag racing, when the slower car leaves before the faster one respective to the speed of the two cars. The race is then more about the skill of the driver than the speed of the car. Once, he raced a Top Fuel Pro drag racer (someone from the fastest drag racing league). Charles started first because of the bracket and the Top Fuel Pro racer caught up to him. They started to fender race. Fender racing is when the racers are neck and neck, then one racer pulls in front by just a bit and then the other driver pulls ahead by just a bit as they continue down the straightaway. All of this happens within four seconds. What the Top Fuel Pro drag racer didn’t realize was that Charles had his transmission adjusted so that when he shifted, there was no negative time between shifts. At the last millisecond before the end of the drag race, Charles jumped right in front of the Top Fuel Pro drag racer and won. When the Top Fuel Pro drag racer lost, he was annoyed but he laughed and said, “I figured out a hundred ways to lose a drag race before, but I just 13

found one hundred and one.” Charles responded, “No, you didn’t find one hundred and one. I just found the number one.”

And they laughed. That’s was how the Wednesday night dragging was just plain fun.

Charles eventually transitioned from drag racing to track racing. One of his buddies that he met on his first night of drag racing kept on telling him that he should come out to Thunderhill. He eventually to drove up to Willows, California to try track racing at Thunderhill Raceway. He started his track racing experience in a beginner class to learn the basics of track racing. He had to put his ego in his back pocket and take the class even though he had been drag racing for years. The course taught him how to be safe on the track. After the first day of racing at Thunderhill, he didn’t really like it. Track racing just didn’t have the same adrenaline rush as drag racing. He went back though, because he wanted to be with the friends he made while drag racing. After two or three days on the track, he was hooked. Charles is not a pro-racer, but that doesn’t matter to him because he loves to race. He has made so many friends throughout the years because almost every person that he has met on the track he has a special bond because of racing.

“ I ’m just an amateur The competition of racing forms racer. I’m not a different kinds of friendships. Racers bond when they race; whether they win or lose, professional racer, but they eagerly get ready to try to win the next time. Charles said about one friend, it doesn’t really matter “I used to race my friend and every time because I enjoy the he beat me I’d try something different with racing so much,” my car and then I’d beat him and he would do something else to his car and he would beat me.”

Charles loved the rivalry. Throughout Charles’ racing experience, he’s blown up five engines, three transmissions, and two rear differentials. His wife, Debora, asked him, “do you know how much money you’ve put into that car?” He knows how much money he’s put into it, but the joy and excitement it has given him in return has been worth it.

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Through the years Charles has had different nicknames because of his license plates. His first plate was BUDSLS3. “Bud’s” because his father’s nickname was Bud, and he bought the car with the money from his estate.

“LS3” because that was the engine in his Corvette. This plate gave him the nickname of Papa. His next plate was TAX MD, which gave him the nickname of Doctor. License plates are a way for the racers to show off their personalities and are just as expressive as the type of car they drive.

Over the past 11 years, Charles has owned 12 Corvettes, a Subaru, and a Camaro at different points in time. He’s had coups and convertibles. Right now, he’s racing a Corvette ZO6 with the ZO7 racing package and a Supercharged 6.2-liter V8 engine. It has 650 horsepower with 650 foot-pounds of torque through a 7-Speed manual transmission. It has a top speed of 195 miles per hour and can go zero to sixty in 3.2 seconds.

Charles loves both track and drag racing. One of his favorite parts about drag racing is the fast pace. He described, saying “what I like about drag racing is, here, then gone tomorrow, boom smack, it’s done. After racing then you have to have the joy of winning or the heartbreak of defeat for the next two hours”. Track racing, “you have wide open straightaways, elevation changes, and unbanked turns. Plus going crazy fast down the straights and hitting a turn perfectly having the back slipping out and gunning it out of the turn. Next, hitting a split in the tarmac and the car becomes airborne coming back down to the ground and burning rubber at one hundred miles an hour. Coming up on someone’s tail and having to break, hoping to not wipe out into his back end. While track racing, you have to be able to see everything going around you and react within milliseconds.”

Charles loves both styles, whether it be the fast-paced, 8-second flood of adrenaline of drag racing, or the careful, ripping, controlled power of track racing. The one try for perfection flying down the straightaway then waiting for two hours to try again when drag racing, or the chance to try again on the next lap for the perfect turn when track racing. These two different styles both attract the same people, the people who love the comradery of racing.

Diagnoses

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harles course changed last year when he went out dinner with a couple of friends one night. They went to a grill for happy hour and ordered hamburgers. The first bite of the hamburger he took got stuck in his throat. With the hamburger stuck in his throat, he hurried off to the restroom. In the bathroom, he got it out of his throat. The next day he called his doctor and scheduled an appointment because it didn’t seem right to him. He went to his appointment and his doctor said it might’ve been an upset stomach, but because of his advanced age (69), the doctor wanted to do some testing. According to statics data from the National Cancer Institute a quarter of new cancer diagnosis come from the 65 to 74 year age range.

The most common age for someone to be diagnosed with cancer is 66 years old. The doctor ordered an endoscopy and a lab test. Charles had the lab test and had to wait four weeks for the endoscopy. The endoscopy discovered cancer on his esophagus and a CAT scan was ordered to find out the extent of the cancer. Charles was diagnosed with terminal esophageal cancer. Esophageal cancer only forms 1% of new cancer cases every year, but only 20% of people diagnosed with Esophageal survive 5 years after being diagnosed. When he found out the extent of the cancer, he went straight to treatment.

He wasn’t able to eat solid food for three months. He was sleeping almost twenty hours a day for two months because his body was putting all his energy into fighting the disease. He had a stent put into his throat to his stomach so that he would be able to eat more easily. Cancer hit him like a ton of bricks, sapping all of the energy from his body. The American Cancer Society reports that patients

with Esophageal cancer symptoms can include weight loss, trouble swallowing, chest pain, hoarseness, chronic cough, vomiting, hiccups, and bone pain.

Charles continued to fight his battle. Now every two weeks he goes to the Kaiser Walnut Creek Infusion Center to get a chemotherapy infusion. The infusion is a mix of five different medicines. He is there for three hours and then he goes home with additional chemo drugs which he calls a “lemon ball”. The lemon ball stays in for two days, slowly giving him the medicine through a port in his chest. He goes back after the two days to have the lemon ball removed.

Charles waited to tell his daughters in person so that they wouldn’t freak out when hearing it over the phone. He took his daughters out to lunch to tell them. When they found out, they were shocked, but it didn’t really set in that their father had just told them he was dying. When he told his racing buddies, they were extremely upset. Everyone knew that Charles had been very healthy and in good shape. However, cancer doesn’t care what type of shape you’re in or what you do, it will come after anyone. After everyone in the racing community found out about his cancer, they reached out with love and support. Charles said “I was really surprised at the outpouring love and support. People came to my assistance with their prayers and with their good thoughts.” Many of his friends have reached out with cards and well wishes. He jokingly said,

“I should get sick more often then I would realize how many friends I really have.”

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Recovery

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fter finding out about his disease and starting treatment, Charles had to take a break from racing for a little while.

This was especially difficult because he had got so much joy and happiness from racing. When he started back racing, his lap times actually became faster. He said, his philosophy for why he became faster after being diagnosed is, “We’re all gonna die someday and I have the privilege of knowing that there’s a 50/50 chance that I can die of cancer. My self-preservation mode has somewhat escaped me.” Charles has taken four seconds off his lap time at Laguna Seca race track, which is only a 1.9-mile course. Cancer has really opened his eyes the world around him. Before the disease, he would go to the track and enjoy his time there, but now he’s able to have less fear on the track and closer bonds with friends.

He is able to have more fun on the track because he isn’t as afraid of going too fast into a turn and having the back of the car slip a bit. He knows that he is going to die one day, whether it’s going to be from cancer or any other of a multitude of things. He is able to better appreciate his days on the track after being diagnosed with cancer. He said, “Overall, cancer has made my racing experience better, better, much better. I can really appreciate the time that I’m at the track with my friends.”

For Charles, racing has become more joyful even though he can’t do as many track days or make as many runs in a day because of his cancer. Despite the fact that this horrible disease has a ruined his life, he’s able to find joy in the things that he loves to do. He hasn’t sunk into depression because he’s able to look at the little things in life, and finds joy in them and doesn’t dwell on the hardship that is cancer.

Before Charles had cancer, he would take his dog for a walk to the lake about three blocks down the road. When he got to the lake, he would be a little tired and have to sit down. He would see the geese flying overhead, ducks flapping their wings in the water and the waves gently brushing up against the shore. He would be there for about a minute and then turn to his dog and say, “Hey Buster, I’m bored. Let me take you home. I want to go back to the office and work.” So he would take his dog home and he would go back to work. Six months later, after the cancer, he went back to that lake again. He sats down and he saw those same geese, the same ducks flapping their wings in the water and the same water brushing up to the shore. He turned down to his dog and said, “Hey Buster, this is pretty cool.” After being diagnosed with cancer he has been able to appreciate the little things in life. He doesn’t take a single minute for granted because he might not have many more left. Charles is able to experience more joy in his day-to-day activities that might have been boring to him before cancer.

Charles had a very close family friend die from cancer last year. She was happy until the day she died.

She lived her life with no regrets, and he wants to follow the example she set. Charles summarized his experience with cancer: “I have no regrets. If I were to die tomorrow, the only regret I would have, would be that, and this is a joke, that I didn’t get to visit all 70 wineries in Livermore where I live.”

Charles plans to live each day to the fullest.

That’s the practice he has followed for the past 8 months. His health is getting better. His doctor doesn’t like to give timelines when she first diagnoses a patient.

However, after a second CAT scan showing that 70% of the cancer was gone from his liver, 60% gone from his esophagus and 50% gone from his upper GI, everyone was amazed. His oncologist told him that when she had originally diagnosed him, she “thought [he] had fallen off the boat without a life preserver, and [he] might live two months.” In fact, Charles has lived 6 months past his original prognosis. He still continues treatment for his 20

cancer hoping that he will go into remission.

He still has pain but not all over anymore. He used to throw up often and now he doesn’t as much. Things are looking better. His spirit is better.

there for him. Spending quality time together.

Kelly has had chronic pain for a lot of her life. One strategy she used to cope with her pain was journaling. Kelly was able to tell her father about how journaling helped her.

He now has a journal so that he has a place to put his feelings about his battle with cancer. Charles reached out to his brother for help with his personal business. His brother drove Charles up to Willows for his first race at Thunderhill Raceway after his diagnosis and treatment for his cancer. This was his journey to recovery. His pathway back to the joy of racing and look at cancer from his rearview mirror.

“I hate my cancer, but I love my new life.”

His rock through this entire ordeal has been his wife, Deborah.

Whether it’s taking him to his chemo appointments or blending his food so he can eat it. She has been there with him through it all.

Charles has had to lean on her for almost everything since being diagnosed with cancer. He also has reached out to several members of his family. His daughters Kelly and Julie have helped by being

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Conclusion T

hrough doing what he loves, finding joy in the little things of life and having a great support system around him, Charles has been able to fight off depression even though he was diagnosed with cancer. He is able to look forward to his days at the track and find joy in them. Charles is now able to see the beauty in the simple things of life and appreciate them more fully. He leans on those around him when he needs help. He took up the proverbial battle against cancer and has not suffered mentally from it. If we also had cancer patients not just get treatment for their cancer but also give them the tools to avoid depression when diagnosed we might reduce the 25% of cancer patients with depression by a significant amount.

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Works Cited

Gerughty, Charles. Personal Interview. March 2019.

Gerughty, Kelly. Personal Interview. March 2019.

Gerughty, Robert. Personal Interview. March 2019.

“Esophageal Cancer.” National Cancer Institute, www.cancer.gov/types/esophageal.

Hart, S. “Depression and cancer: no clear connection.” Science News, 2 Sept.

1989, p. 150. Student Resources in Context, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A7934973/GPS?u=moun43602&sid=GPS&xid=f0e65655.

Accessed 1 Apr. 2019.

UCLA researchers to study depression in breast cancer survivors.” Women’s Health Weekly, 22 Nov. 2012, p. 125. Global Issues in Context, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A309821788/GPS?u=moun43602&sid=GPS& xid=3d5a1e65. Accessed 2 Apr. 2019.

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About the Author

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erby Gerughty is a junior at Freestyle Academy of Communication Arts and Technology. He loves running track and cross country. He is a very passionate leader in his youth group. He wants to become a full time recording engineer or audio engineer for concerts. He wants to help artist spread joy and promote love through their music. He also wants to design promotional material and artwork in his free time. Kerby wants to achieve both of these goals by going to college and majoring in audio engineering with a minor in graphic design.

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