If anybody has read my Twitter feed recently, they will know that I am no fan of Lance Armstrong. I admit that back in 1993, when I had just started racing, I had a poster of Lance Armstrong on my wall, as the blue-eyed Texan was good eye candy for a 14 year old. But when he came back from having the cancer and started to become extremely successful, I was dubious. Don't get me wrong, back in 1999, I wasn't that up on blood doping, although I had heard of EPO being used, but I never suspected Lance of doing so. No, I was suspicious because he had a "legal" way, supported by doctor's prescriptions, of taking, what I believed to be, a large amount of steroids in an effort to remain in remission. Having said that, I also thought that he must have been riding his bike an awful lot, as he was thin, despite presumably taking steroids at some point. But I was only a student at University studying French and Italian. What did I really know about what drugs people take? Nothing, apart from through personal experience.
No, I have never had cancer, so I do not know what that is like. And, yes, Lance has undoubtedly raised awareness for a condition that can be fatal; I have had family members suffer from it, with untimely deaths resulting in certain instances. And I have seen how much weight a cancer victim can put on, and lose, through taking steroids to try and wage the war against the condition. But everybody knows about cancer and its dangers. I am not an oncologist so I am not about to talk about something I know only a limited amount about, because that would be wrong. Instead, I am going to concentrate on what nobody seems to be thinking about at the moment - the consequences of doping.
I am epileptic and I take medication on a daily basis to control my brain. Epilepsy is a condition which affects the way the brain works and can result in fits. I don't like taking drugs, but I have to do so in order to lead a normal life. When I started taking medication at the age of 15, the only thing that the doctors would mention about side effects was the possibility of my unborn child developing spina bifida, or having learning difficulties in its formative years. That was enough to put me off ever trying to have a baby. But the scary thing was that these drugs controlled my brain, but could also affect an unborn child? And the doctors were willing to give me these drugs?
That was the side effect they told me about. What they didn't tell me was that it would affect my heart rate so that I could never get it over 180, when I was 17. Okay, there may have been other factors, but it was enough for my coach at the time to persuade me to change medication. Which I did.
The new medication was supposed to be better for the unborn child (that I was never having). Great. But they failed to mention that the tablets that I was taking to control the frenzied neurological goings on in my brain also affected my bone density, made me put weight on, could lead to osteoperosis and problems with the level of white blood cells in your blood. Oh, and that it would ultimately lead to me developing chronic fatigue. 15 years I was on those tablets. 15 years. That's a long time when I'm only 33 now. So, I came off those drugs and went on to a newer drug, which has supposed to have less side effects. No doubt I may find out in 10 years' time that there are still side effects - the drug just isn't old enough to have shown its true colours yet.
I apologise for going off on a tangent, but there is a point here. I struggle to believe that people are stupid enough to take drugs that are untested to a large extent. They are playing God with their own lives. Look at Marco Pantani, Flo Jo, even Tom Simpson - all known drug takers and all died an untimely death. If I had been an athlete in the 1980s, 1990s or even now, and I knew that I had taken drugs to enhance my performance, I would be absolutely bricking it. Not because people might find out that I had taken drugs, but because they haven't thought about the consequences of doping. I would be straight off to the doctor for an MOT, to find out if there are any signs that I could prevent an early death. If the doctor doesn't know what you've done to yourself, he can't help you overcome the potential pitfalls. It might not be an untimely death, but that's the point about taking any drug - you don't know what side effects you will suffer from and how bad it will be.
So have a thought about your health - put your desire to win/greed or whatever other motivation you had aside for a second and do yourself a favour - come clean. It's for your own good.
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